We lived on Minniehaha St in Granada Hills.

I am subject to deep spams of nostalgia. An old faded photo came to my attention during my recent move. It was a 1956 picture of a family that I lived with once. I am the tallest one in the group. We are all smiling from one year Michael in his Mother's arms to ten year old Nancy standing in front of her Mom. In front of me is eight year old Christopher hugging three year old Kerry.

This was a busy happy time in my life. I had just been promoted to Manager of the Schlumberger district in Newhall. We had just moved from Santa Maria to a new tract of homes. It must have been  a high class neighborhood to have a street named Minniehaha. Every house came with an incinerator in the backyard. You can barely make ours out at the far end of the swing-set. It looked like a standing man and was call a General Pershing. I never got to use it because LA County outlawed all trash burning at that time. It was in the early stages of the war against smog. In the Valley you could only see blue sky if you looked straight up and then it was a tiny bit of blue. Everything else was covered with smog.

Nancy and Chris participated in a hula hoop contest in Granada Hills. They were darn good. Jackie and I spent many happy evenings playing peanuckle with new friends Phil and Lorena Aber. They became lifetime friends. We drove over the hills to. the Simi Valley and visited the set where the TV Series "Riin Tin Tin" was filmed. I took an evening class at UCLA. The class was on geology.

Granada Hills is a town in the Northwest corner of the San Fernando valley. Newhall was just over the hills out of the Valley ro the North.

We spent about two years in the Valley. We have many happy memories. It was my second sojourn in the Valley as I lived in Van Nuys for a couple of years when I was seven.  In the McKinley School for Boys. The Valley then was mostly farm land.