Memories of Ann Elizabeth Powell Hibbard - Episode 4

At the turn of the century when the Spanish American war started, my father and his friends were at the age to enlist to see some of the world. Many of them did but my father came down with typhoid fever and wasn’t able to go with them but by the time my father was finally graduating from Normal School the government was sending out an appeal for teachers to volunteer to go to the Philippines to teach English. Since he had missed the war, here was his chance for adventure. He never talked much about those early days but he had many friends who I later knew as a child who came to the house and who also stayed in the Philippines. The first load of teachers went out on the Army transport Thomas. In later years there would be reunions of those original Thomasites who stayed in Manila. The Thomas was a regular transport to Manila from San Francisco for many years and there were lots of tales about those trips. My first trip back to the States when I was two was made on the Thomas because my father was still working for the Government.

One of my father’s friends in those days was a man named Fisher. I believe he was someone he knew in Kansas who went out during the war and decided to stay. Later a number of my friends in school were sons and daughters of American soldiers who decided to stay in the Philippines. In 1907 my father and Mr. Fisher decided to come home for a visit and they planned to go on around the world instead of going back across the Pacific. I don’t know what their itinerary was but my mother’s engagement ring was an oriental pearl he bought on the way back before he had even met her. We had pictures of my father and Mr. Fisher taken on camels in front of the pyramids and he also brought home a beautiful cameo that he must have gotten in Italy and I do remember his telling about seeing the ruins in Pompeii. On this trip home my father met and married my mother. Mr. Fisher did not go back to Manila but many years later when we were back in the States on a visit we stayed a few days with the Fishers who were living in Seattle.

As I said earlier, my mother and Aunt Beth were good friends so when my father planned to come to LeRoy to see his younger sister, she became match maker and planned an all day picnic for the four of them, she, her husband, my father and my mother.

Jane's Notes: I have that engagement ring with the oriental pearl. It's a lovely old fashioned setting and if fits me perfectly. I enjoy wearing it.