Alice Page, the oldest of six children, was born on a farm three miles north of O'Neill, Nebraska on August 17, 1915. At the age of nine, she and her family moved to the Southwest Missouri town of West Plains where again, her father was engaged in farming. When Alice was twelve years of age, the family returned to O'Neill where she continued her schooling. She graduated in 1931 at the age of fifteen, the Valedictorian of her class of twenty-two students.The career options of most women in those days would be a teacher or a secretary. Alice hadn't taken typing, so she "expected to be a teacher." At that time, a high school education was sufficient to teach school---she had completed two years of normal training and had received a third grade teaching certificate. The fall of 1931 found Alice teaching in a rural school in Atkinson, Nebraska. Things did not progress as Alice had hoped---she became ill and after recovering returned to the classroom, but there were 'discipline problems'. She knew she "was not doing a good job of teaching" and "didn't know how to manage a classroom". She wrote a letter of resignation to the school board and on March 1, 1932, she "returned home very discouraged and feeling like a failure."
She resided in the family home until the age of twenty when she was hired as a cook and went to live on a ranch north of O'Neill. "I knew how to cook, and was successful." Twenty years later, she returned to the teaching profession, and taught in various country schools around O'Neill for eighteen years. (She taught my own husband when he was in Kindergarten.)
Alice then began working for what is now North Star Services, assisting handicapped adults. She retired from this profession at the age of sixty-four in 1979. By this time, she and her mother--now a widow--had moved into O'Neill. For the next ten to eleven years, Alice was involved with Women's Aglow, a world wide Christian Women's Organization. In November of 1983, she had the opportunity to travel to Washington, D.C. during an Aglow conference. She was "so excited to go to Washington, D.C." In fact, six months earlier, she had dreamt that she was in the White House, and on this trip, that dream was fulfilled.
Her interests and hobbies are reading, "an avid reader...I read anything worthwhile that I can get my hands on," and the accordion. She acquired her first accordion in 1954, and learned how to play using the instruction booklet that accompanied it. She plays the instrument at her church, the Full Gospel Church of Ewing, Nebraska.
Alice could also be considered a 'globe trotter', as she has visited Russia fourteen times. Alice relates the following with a smile and the comment, "This is an interesting story..." In 1995 while riding to church in Ewing with the Dick Wallace family, Dick asked her, "How would you like to go to Russia?" (Wallace had been traveling to Russia with a group for a couple of years on mission trips to distribute Russian language Bibles.) Alice said, she "kind of took that (question) as an invitation, but afterwards Dick admitted that he was just trying to make conversation." Her answer? "Well, I'm almost 80 years old." She didn't think anymore about it until the next morning when she was reading her Bible. She had just started reading in Exodus about Moses and the Burning Bush. "And as I closed my Bible, I felt distinctly that the Lord said to me, "Moses was 80 years old." "And I began to pray about it, and the more I prayed, the more I knew I was supposed to go to Russia."Her first trip was that October with the United by the Cross Ministries, headed by Dick Wallace. The first several years the group (consisting of about 5-6 individuals from the O'Neill area) would pick up Bibles in Moscow and take them to the town of Ludinovo, which is 300 miles southwest of Moscow. Their usual route has been to fly to Moscow, take the train to Bryansk, and then Russian friends would pick them up for the final forty mile trek to Ludinovo. The group has always worked in the villages surrounding this town of approximately 41,400 (2005 estimates) citizens. Other than distributing Bibles, they have also handed out medical supplies to hospitals, and gifts to children in orphanages and schools. On Sundays, they would go out in villages with Russian musicians and give their testimonies. On one occasion, when the mission group was holding an outdoor meeting in a park, a group of Russian Orthodox leaders argued with them. The Russian Orthodox community "had co-operated with the government through the Communist years and they felt like they were the only church that had the right to be in Russia."
Currently, there are three villages around Ludinovo that have active church groups. The mission team visits with pastors and churches to encourage them. "In one instance, a pastor was trying to get work started in a village and he arranged for us to have a service in the village. Some man from the village went around to all the houses and warned the people not to attend our service. The result was we had a good crowd." They have been helping a man build a church who had been a pastor in the underground church all through the Communist years. "According to Russian law, they don't recognize a group as a church unless they have a physical address." Through the generosity of givers, a log cabin has been purchased and carpenters were hired to remodel the building. On this recent trip, the progress had been revealed: wide boards were in place for flooring, plastered walls had been painted a glossy white, and there were boards for benches.
The mission group has also seen the fruits of their endeavors... a woman from one of the villages took it upon herself to begin an outreach to the homeless people who lived around a train station in Bryansk. She, along with a few helpers would provide a once weekly meal of soup and bread, do minor medical procedures such as bandaging wounds, and pass out Bibles. They suspect the open sores that many of the people suffer from are the result of the Chernobyl nuclear accident which happened nearby.
I asked Alice if she had any goals or anything she would still like to do: "There's not much left to attempt at this stage in my life...I had my 94th birthday in Russia this year...celebrated with a cake covered with cherries on top and one candle in the middle...appreciated it." Any unfulfilled dreams? "Well, I never got married." "I would have liked to have been married but it didn't work out." Overall, what would you say about your life, are you happy, content? "I gave my heart to the Lord when I was 5 and 1/2 years old. I've always loved the Lord and we've always gone to church...folks never missed church unless somebody was sick or the car wouldn't start. Been a lifetime habit with me."
Alice recently completed a written history of her family, which I have had the privilege to read...I think the final paragraph that Alice penned, beautifully sums up her perspective on life: "Our parents were always faithful in Sunday School and church attendance. Whenever the church doors were open, we were all there. And our parents set an example of Christian living---they paid tithes in the hardest of times; they were scrupulously honest, hospitable, and trusted God in all circumstances. As far as I know, all six of us children have followed their example. May we all, like them, be an example and an influence for God and for the right in this world until the trumpet of God shall sound the resurrection call."
And that is a life of service, a life well-lived.
J.R.
Keith and Vickie May, high school sweethearts originally from Pierce, Nebraska, have been married since 1975. They have three children; Tracy, Jeff, and Lindsey, and three grandsons. Keith and Vickie moved to O'Neill in 1979 when Keith was transferred to Carhart Lumber Company. Currently, Keith and Vickie are employed at O'Neill Lumber LTD. Vickie, who has a background in bookkeeping and accounting, works alongside her husband at the lumber yard, keeping the books and filling in wherever and whenever needed. She states that Keith is her best friend and best supporter of her interests. They reside on a beautiful acreage north of O'Neill, where they keep their horses and enjoy the freedom and solitude of country living.
Vickie took Home Economics class in high school, and after marriage, sewed for her children, but when she took a quilting class from local resident Alice Torpin, she knew quilting was 'it'. She has been hand quilting for herself since 1983, yet she had a dream to one day have her own machine quilting business. In 2002, she and Keith began attending quilt shows, researching and looking at computerized quilting machines, and inquiring as to what particular features people did and did not like.
Vickie believes in 'stepping out in faith' as evidenced by many examples in her life, one of which was when she ordered her computerized quilting machine in May of 2006, before her business loan was even approved. But, "God worked it out"... the loan went through, and the machine was delivered and set up on June 15, 2006. She named her business 'Old Glory Quilting Company'----"my way of being reminded everyday of the sacrifices of our men and women in the military that have made it possible for me to pursue my dream." She adds that this business "wouldn't have been possible without the support of my family".
Most of Vickie's customers are in Nebraska, but she has also filled orders from New York, West Virginia, Virginia, and Maine. People find out about her business through word of mouth and from relatives living in this area. Vickie quipped, "Thank heavens they took a chance on me". Sometimes she gets a bit anxious when her quilting orders are getting low, but (God) "has never failed to send them (quilts) when I need them".
An old grain elevator...
Taking a drink before she heads out to pasture...
Humrich has been taking piano and acoustic guitar lessons for six years, (he is currently giving piano lessons to his first student) and occasionally joins in with the youth group band at Faith Community Church.
Nick is no 'slacker'... he's helped out with Vacation Bible School for several summers, cuts lawns, and works evenings at a local discount store. This fall, he will be taking a class at the public high school in addition to his home studies. Future plans include earning an Atmospheric Science Degree in Meteorology, hopefully at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln.
Jackie, age 12, and now an 8th grader, is also home schooled and enjoys it because she can work at her own pace. She is a quiet and interesting young lady who enjoys archery, gardening with her father, camping and fishing with her father and Nick, and playing the piano.
Her unique talent is the unicycle, an interest first sparked by other home schooling friends. She mastered the cycle in about 2-3 weeks, and remarked that the more she fell and got back on, the more her confidence increased. She, along with other unicyclists, ride in the local St.Patrick's Day parade every March.
Melodie and her husband Eric, along with their five children, are fairly recent transplants from Tucson, Arizona, having moved to rural Page, Nebraska about six years ago. Eric works with his father in their insurance business. Melodie, who besides having a degree in literature and loves to read, is a work at home mother who in addition to home schooling her children, has an interest in using plant materials and ingredients from her pantry to create body scrubs, dry shampoos, soaps, lip balms, face scrubs, healing salves, and 'bug bars'.
About six years ago, while still living in Tucson, Tompkins began experimenting with recipes found on line and in books to use in creating her skin care products. In addition to ordering many of her natural bases and additives such as bees wax and essential oils from on-line, she also grows her own sage and mallow. If a particular recipe happens to call for oats, she will simply reach for a container from her own kitchen food pantry.
Tompkins enjoys learning about plants that the Native Americans and the Pioneers used for their natural healing properties, such as aloe, and Plantain, a small herb that is often considered a lawn weed. One of her most favorite books on the subject is, 'Weeds of Nebraska and the Great Plains', published by the Nebraska Department of Agriculture, which she has nearly 'devoured'. She praises the healing properties of the Plantain plant which is used in making her salve with dried calendula, vitamin E, and a natural beeswax base. She spoke of using this salve on a horse's open wound, with the results being the closing and quick healing of the injury. She also used it on their dog when he was hit by a car. His skin on one leg had been peeled back, and this salve dramatically enhanced the healing process. She says, "This is an all-purpose skin healer."
While I interviewed Melodie, she pulled a small grinder from her kitchen cabinet and proceeded to mix a recipe for for her face scrub: oats, dried chamomile, and ground sage, to which she added a few drops of oil to hold the mixture together. This would be placed in the palm of one's hand, and then rubbed on the face with a washcloth and then rinsed off.
Her soaps are made of all natural bases 
Nancy stresses that she and Jarrel "do this business together." In addition to his ranching activities and driving a school bus, both of them attend auctions together where Jarrel purchases those items that have potential ("furniture is a big thing"). He cleans up the items by sandblasting or power washing, and then brings them in for Nancy to add the finishing touches. He also runs the store while Nancy is riding the speaker circuit for Stonecroft Ministries, a non-denominational, world-wide ministry that seeks to reach the un-churched.
A real treat for store customers is 'Ace' the resident greeter. Winings says "Ace runs the store." "He breaks the ice and entertains kids with his funny antics. He can sing, whisper, talk normal, sit up and squat down. He seems to know that this is his job and he loves to come to work." In fact, it "hurts his feelings when he doesn't get to." Winings recounted the story that one day she told Ace he had to stay home, and when she got in the car to leave for work, there he was in the seat next to her. She has no idea how he slipped in unseen by her.
In February of this year, Jarrel and Nancy started their own 'Doggone Good Road Show', bringing in three appraisers from Omaha, who did over 350 appraisals in two days. They are planning another event in February of 2010.
Ace is keeping an eye out for customers...
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