IDA and GEORGE
(Mom and Dad)
PERSONAL STUFF
SINGAPORE
This picture was taken in Singapore, and is included simply
to show how I might have looked if I lived in the tropics year around.
FAMILY VACATION IN THE 1960s
This is how the family went on vacation. All 5 of us (my dad is taking the photo, as usual)
in the family Ford, with the tent and everything else tied on the roof. I was youngest, so I always
had to ride the hump in the back seat. In the pic is mom, then my middle brother Jay (in the chinos),
then my oldest brother Gary.
COULD THIS BE THE INSPIRATION FOR THE ABBEY ROAD COVER?
While getting into formation for a parade, I think our grade school band created a version of the Abbey Road album
cover...
ST JOE RIVER
Here are the Weyermann boys on the St Joe River.
NATIVE AMERICAN CHIEF AND HIS WIFE - ARLEE, MONTANA
My dad like to take us to Indian pow-wows in western Montana. These were gatherings of tribal members
from around the area, and they seemed to welcome white people (although there were never many white people
there). Here my dad posed us with the Chief of the local tribe. The people at the pow-wow lived in teepees
and pole tents.
A DIFFICULT PERIOD TO LOOK BACK AT
I'm just going to say it - this is a picture of me going trick or treating in blackface. And after that
I went trick or treating in drag. If it makes it
any better, and of course it doesn't, in the first picture I am holding a UNICEF container to collect
money for foreign kids. But in the second picture no UNICEF container, just me going arm in arm with
what?, Raggedy Andy after he gave up and really let himself go?
IS IT BASKETBALL OR IS IT INTERPRATIVE DANCE?
In the first pic I am showing off those long legs as I run tippy toe down the court. And in the
second pic the whole team apperently decides to run in reverse, as if on cue.
USING CHILDREN AS YARD STICKS
Dad always liked to include the family in pictures. What better way to document a large log
than to be able to say it was 3 weyermanns in diameter?
WHEN DAD WAS A PROFESSIONAL SLALOM SKIER
Speaking of dad, here he is water skiing on one ski. This is probably Couer d'Alene Lake near
our house in St Maries. I could never get up on one ski, but every one else could.
MOM AND DAD, THE FAMILY YEARS
Here are the parents. Mom is in uniform, I think she must have been a den mother for
cub scouts or something. I think that is our house in Kalispell Montana, so I would have been in first grade.
THE YEAR THE LEAVES ON THE GROUND WERE KNEE DEEP
This is me with Mitzi and Suki. At least I think it was Mitzi, we had another cocker spaniel
named Judy at one time too. I did really love that cat.
THE LEAST LIKELY PERSON TO RIDE ON A FLOAT AS A WEIGHTLIFTER
The pic is out of focus, and you kind of have to zoom in, but that is me on the Mikes Drugs
float lifting what looks like a huge
barbell, but which was just a couple of empty coffee cans on a broom stick. But the question really is - why would
anyone put a scrawny kid like that on a float, sitting on a pedastal that says 'STRENGTH'?
Well, Mike's Drugs was owned by my best friend Jimmy's father. And
Jimmy most likely had enough sense to tell his dad he wasn't going to parade through town in his
swim suit. But when they asked me, I probably figured 'Why not? What could possibly be embarassing about
this?'
WHY THE THREE LITTLE PIGS MADE THEIR HOUSE OUT OF BRICKS
At some point years ago the city of Missoula Montana decided to put on a giant balloon parade.
You know, like the Macy's day parade. Anyway, some company came to town with a canned parade for hire,
and the city paid them to dazzle the citizenry. The company needed many volunteers to control the giant
balloons, and to manipulate the small parade items. Turns out the Boy Scouts are known for their
volunteerism and community pride, and so I ended up carying the small straw house of Three Little Pigs fame.
The Big Bad Wolf was the giant balloon, and volunteers in pig costumes and carrying small pig houses
would dance around the wolf balloon as we wound through town. The straw house was very heavy - it had a pipe
inner structure, and heavy sheets of fabric and straw for walls and roof, and no real harness to carry the
weight. So you just grabbed a couple of pipes and herked it up and carried it as best you could.
The thing started coming apart after about
one block, and it was all I could do to try to keep it together, let alone dance around. It was too windy on
parade day, so the giant balloons were dragged through town on wheeled carts. But since the company had
free labor, I'm sure they made a ton of money anyway.
WHEN HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF
How could I know as a wee lad trying out a firefinder on a visit to a lookout tower with the family,
that one day I would have my own lookout tower, and use the firefinder for real?