Uncle Les

When I first moved into my house and painted it peach, for some unexplainable reason I kept thinking of my Uncle Les and Aunt Myrtle.  I told Mom about this random thought that kept wandering around in my head. Turns out Uncle Les's house was painted peach when I was young.   Memory is such a funny thing.

My Dad's second oldest brother was named Leslie David Robertson.  I assume he was named David after his grandfather, David Brodock.

Win, John, Les

Uncle Les was short, dark, and wiry.  I remember him smoking cigarettes and dropping the ashes into his pants' cuff.  When I was around six, he shot questions at me about people in the Old Testament.  When I could not answer who was the oldest person in the Bible, he informed my Mom that our church wasn't teaching me anything.  I guess that was his argument to support why we should join the Jehovah's Witnesses like he did.

When Uncle Les was fifteen, he ran away from home.  He was the oldest student in the school at York.  I gather from talk that I heard that the teacher viewed him her own personal servant.  Since he was the oldest, she had him hauling water and chopping the wood for both the school and the teacherage.  I imagine the older students had responsibilities to help out with wood and water, but this teacher pushed him to the limit.  One day he informed her, he would be happy to help out in any
way, provided she would sleep with him.  Fifteen year old boys.

Apparently, the thought of what was going to happen to him at home scared him a lot more than leaving home and shouldering life's responsibilities.   Uncle Les hit the road.  His travels took him the the South where he served on a chain gang.  He was found guilty of vagrancy.  He hated the South after that experience.  He swam in the great Salt Lake.  When he got salt in his eyes, an old man helped him by rinsing his eyes out with water.  He eventually found work with the circus and then on the race horse circuit. He met and married Aunt Myrtle and helped her raise her son.  He became a baker and returned to Montana.

Les on right

After working as a baker for some years, the dust from the flour began causing damage to his lungs. Nowadays, I'm sure Les would be expected to relax and let the government support him as he lived out his days.  In those days, people weren't trained to think of the government as a benefactor to help them out of every tough spot.   With money he saved, Uncle Les bought a dump truck and went to work as a contract truck driver for Helena Sand and Gravel.   When that truck wore out, he purchased another one.

He was interested in horse racing all his life, although he was savvy enough with money not to get involved financially when he got out of that business.  He and Dad had some in depth discussions about race horses.  I particlarly remember how impressed they were with Secretariat, the triple crown winner in 1973.

I remember riding in the dump truck once.  That was a pretty big thrill for a little girl.  I remember him telling me to listen and pointing out that a robin was singing his "rain song."  I recall that he gave me five dollars when I graduated high school.  When my grandparents had birthdays and anniversaries, he made the most beautiful cakes for them that I have ever seen.

Uncle Les had his faults. He was "owly" when it came to money. I imagine that being

Les, Winifred

hungry and sleeping on park benches could make a person tight with a buck. When he died of a stroke in his 80's, everything he owned was paid for, and he had over a hundred thousand dollars in the bank. One regret I have is not taking the time to ask him about his own life.  I wish his adventures would have been recorded for posterity.

Les, OD Robertson, Maude Brodock Robertson