Benjamin Reagan and Hannah
Polk's 67th Wedding Anniversary Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Reagan celebrated their sixty-seventh wedding anniversary Wednesday afternoon at the home of their daughter, Mrs. George Taylor, 3951 North Illinois Street, where Mr. and Mrs. Reagan have lived for several years. Mr. Reagan was eighty-seven years old this month and Mrs. Reagan is two months younger. However, both are sturdy and energetic with a wealth of interesting reminiscences that are the delight of their young grandson. "Many almost miraculous changes have come about during my
lifetime," said Mr. Reagan as he turned off the radio while chatting with a caller.
"50 years ago if we had heard that voice, coming apparently from "I also remember when I was a boy, about 13, living on the farm near
Greensboro and Mr. and Mrs. Reagan were married on the farm of Mrs. Reagan's father in Henry County, Mr. Reagan riding to the wedding horseback. They lived on the farm for a time, then moved to Knightstown, where they lived a number of years, moving to Lincoln, Nebraska in 1879. Mr. Reagan built the first store building in a small town called Raymond, Neb., where he had a lumbar yard, grocery and general store for some time. They returned to Indiana in 1901 and have lived in Indianapolis for the last 25 years. Two children are living, Mrs. Tressa Reagan Taylor and Thomas E. Reagan of Indianapolis. This site maintained by John Reagan and last updated January 06, 2008 |
the air, we would have thought the end of the world
had come. Why, I remember well the first time I talked over a telephone. I was living in
Nebraska at that time but was in Greensboro, Ind., on a visit buying some trees, in fact,
to take back to Nebraska. I talked to my brother who was in Knightstown and thought it was
just marvelous. I also remember quite well seeing my first motor car. It was in Jackson
Park, Chicago, and people crowded there from miles around to see the 'horseless carriage',
and all these things have come about in a short period of time. Way back when I was a boy,
I remember on the farm how we used to cut acres and acres of grain with a small sickle and
hook arrangement we held in our hand. That was slow work. When the first horse-drawn
reaper came out, we thought it was great. It looked a good deal like a flying machine.
Then, the binder came out. One rich farmer in our neighborhood, I remember, bought a
binder, which made the farm hands mad for it meant that he wouldn't need many hands with
that machine and they had been getting high wages, as high as $1.50 a day, so one morning
when the rich farmer came out to start his binder, he found it burned up. He bought
another and it was burned up. Funny, wasn't it?"
walking to school a mile and a half,
how I used to make the fires and sweep out the school building every morning. But the
thrill of the day was when school was out, to go over on the bank nearby and watch the men
putting in the Pennsylvania railroad, the first railroad between Richmond and
Indianapolis. And what a thrill I had when the first excursion train ran over those tracks
with me riding in it! Those coaches make me laugh when I think of them today. They were
old boxcars with boards nailed across for seats. But I thought it was the height of luxury
to be whizzed along on a train. I also can well remember the first electric light I saw.
It had no globe or glass on it. It was in the old Union Station in Indianapolis but it was
spluttering and fizzing, making the biggest fuss you ever saw, but that was a sight to
us."