We bought this house when we returned to the United States in 1976 from our assignment in Germany. The house was almost finished when we bought it, so we stayed in an Howard Johnson motel for a few weeks while waiting for the occupancy permit to be issued. We sold the house in 1989 when we moved to Pleasant View, Utah.

The people who bought the house in 1989 have lived there since and the woman is now a widow. The trees and foliage have just about consumed the house. The driveway is like it was … with the bend in the driveway just as bad as it always was. This is the house where our kids all grew up.

We went out to eat twice with Pam and Ed. This one was at the Red Robin restaurant in Willougby, Ohio for lunch. The snow had started and by evening we had plenty of snow to contend with on the drive home.

Ed and his buddies get together each Tuesday evening to practice for a couple of hours. Nina, Pam, and I had spent the day visiting the covered bridges in Ashtabula County and got back to Pam’s house just in time for the boys to start practicing. The next two and a half hours were just absolutely delightful. Ed has an amazing talent!

We lived about 13 years in Chardon and the downtown area was an important part of Chardon life. In the 1830’s, Kirtland was part of Geauga County where Chardon was the county seat. As a result, Joseph Smith went often (particularly in 1838 and 1839) to Chardon for various court appearances. The Ohio Legislature created a new county called Lake County in 1840 to separate the Mormons from the rest of northeastern Ohio. By that time, the Mormons had left the area for Missouri and Illinois.

The Geauga County Courthouse sits on the eastern side of the central park in Chardon.

The gazebo on the green is a favorite spot for weddings and many other community events. We would come up to the green in the summer for band concerts in the gazebo. Ed and his band plays occasionally in the gazebo or elsewhere on the green during the summer.

About 4″ of snow had fallen when we drove around the square taking pictures. By the next morning close to a foot of snow was on the ground. Chardon gets a lot of snow, particularly lake effect snow from Lake Erie.

The Park Auditorium and School was an elementary school and the only school auditorium when we lived in Chardon. Since then it looks like a nice auditorium has been built at the high school. All of our children performed in plays, musicals, recitals, and other events in this auditorium.

James, Heather, and Dawnmarie all graduated from Chardon High School. We moved to Pleasant View, Utah when Trevor was a senior. He attended all but his final semester in Chardon but graduated from Weber High in Pleasant View, Utah.

We left Chardon, heading towards Albany, New York on Saturday, November 15th. The big lake-effect storm was underway. This was the storm that dropped six feet of snow in the Buffalo, New York area. We had nine inches of snow that required me to climb up on the roof and remove the snow so that we could close the slide-out. With that, we said goodbye to Pam and drove off. We stopped to get gas at the freeway entrance at I-80 and Ohio Route 44 … and Pam showed up to say one last goodbye!