"Lakewood, California
20 March 1971

Dear Michael,

Am sorry my last letter, in which I described the overland trip in a covered wagon we took when I was a boy, was lost in the mail. Well, here goes again. Like I said in my last letter, I think I'd better write it to all of you children because it may be of interest to all of you.

Our trip began in Springfield, Illinois. We had moved there from Jacksonville where I was born, when I was three years old. I must have been seven years old when we started. My father had a memo book that he kept in his pocket and it had the date on it - 1903. I remember asking him what it meant and he explained it to me.

A friend of my father's had a lot to do with us taking the trip. We bought a wagon and made a cover for it. We bent hickory sticks to use as a support for the canvas. We bought a gasoline stove and a lantern, as well as a tent. My father, the other man and myself slept in the tent. Mother and my two sisters slept in the wagon. We would come to a good camping place and then we would pitch the tent. Mother would cook the evening meal. We were usually quite tired so we would go to bed early. We were quite proud of our wagon. It had springs - most covered wagons didn't. We had three horses so that every third day one got to rest. It would walk along behind the wagon. One of the horses was blind. Her name was Daisy.

We left Springfield early one morning and went to Jacksonville to tell my grandparents goodbye. We stayed there overnight and started early the next morning. That night we camped at Beardstown on the bank of the Illinois River. The mosquitoes were terrible. After that we never camped on a river bank.

We crossed the Mississippi River at Hannibal, Missouri. We camped next to a house in Hannibal. Their little girl, about four years old, drank a can of lye and was in pretty bad shape. My mother helped her mother until she was out of danger, then we started on. We followed the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad out of Hannibal. We went thru Maberly and Sedalia and a lot of other towns. I remember Maberly because they had horses pulling the street cars.

Usually my sisters and I and whichever man was not driving, would get out and walk, especially if the road was sandy or uphill. There were not any highways like we have now - just wagon trails off through the fields. We would get lost quite often. Then we would stop at a farm house and ask directions to the next town. I remember walking thru immense fields of sunflowers. We would pick sunflowers and pull the petals off one at a time, saying, "she loves me, she loves me not".

We ran into a lot of rain just before we got to Arkansas City, Kansas. We stopped there at a wagon yard and dried out. A wagon yard was where the farmers would camp when they came to town. Maybe it would take days to get there from their farms. Wagon yards would be called motels today.

We crossed the stateline into Oklahoma and were trying to get to Ponca City, Oklahoma, but we got lost out on the prairie. We came to a house and Father went in to ask directions. We had come to a fork in the road and didn't know which way to go. Two Indian men came out with Father. They seemed more interested in the horses than anything, but after looking the horses over one pointed to one of the roads and said "Ponca City".

Our trip ended in Guthrie, which then was the capital of the state. My father and the other man went to work there. My father was a cigar maker and he never had any trouble finding a job. We stayed in Guthrie for about a month, then my father went to Shawnee and sent for us after he got a job there.

I'll never forget the trip. It took us three months. Today in a car it would probably take a day, but we didn't rush. I hope you will find this interesting.

Love to you all,

Grandpa"

There is no date on the picture, but on the back Dad wrote: "Put an ink spot over 'yours truly' so you would know me. The man with a 'conductors uniform', the man with a mustache, is our chief at the amusement hall. The man next to him on his left is a chief electrician. The one on his right is a commisary steward and he is a dandy. The one next to him is a chief master-at-arms."

In Los Angeles, California, March 30, 1929, Dad married my mother, Nora Charlotte Donnelly. She was born in Mountain City, Johnson County, Tennessee and moved with her family to Floweree, Montana in 1912. Click here to see the story of the family in Montana.

My Favorite World War II/Christmas Picture Casimir Herman Frederick Schulz (1894-1976) Nora Charlotte Donnelly Schulz (1906-1974) Hugh Casimir Schulz (1930-1986) Mary Floy Schulz Katzman (1936 - ) We were living in Washington, D.C. when this picture was taken December 24, 1943. We didn't get to see Dad very much until he was assigned to shore duty in April 1944, but Dad's ship had put in to Norfolk, VA for a little while and he was able to come home for about 10 days. Grandpa Schulz came up from Tampa, Florida after Christmas and stayed until Dad went back to sea shortly after New Year's Day. I was in 2nd grade at the time and one day he was my "show and tell". Dad came to school in full dress uniform, talked to the children in my class and they asked him all kinds of questions. Nearly all the children's fathers were away in the war or not coming back and that day he was Father to all.

With The Grandchildren Cynthia Marie Katzman (1959 - ) Michael Scott Katzman (1963 - ) Patricia Diane Katzman (1964 - ) This picture was taken just before we took Dad to the airport for his return to California. None of us wanted him to go back and Patricia's face showed that.

This is the last picture of Dad and Mother, taken 2 weeks before Mother died and 1 1/2 years before Dad.

The Official U.S. Navy Page

The Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships

List of U.S. Navy Ships

Naval Historical Center