Jigsaws, yardsticks, and quiltblocks

Dad and I spent an afternoon trying to remember the businesses in Pierce, Nebraska, and their locations along Main Street. Recollections set off by a whiff of sawdust let me find the hardware store of my dreams. Not that I dream of owning a hardware store, but that this particular hardware store image has popped up in dreams for as long as I can remember.

The dream glimpse is full of dustmotes in the sunbeam coming from a high window, giving the interior a pixie dust magic. There are just two aisles down the lenghth of the store, and in the center is the stack of galvanized buckets and tubs. The left wall is covered with little drawers for all the different sizes of nails, screws, bolts, hinges, and other bits of hardware. Above the main floor is a mezzanine.

It took a meandering trip through our combined memory lanes to get to this satisfying solution. We began at Steinkraus General Store, which I usually avoided on my childhood strolls because it smelled funny. We added the Rexall Drug with its display of comic books in the south window, and the Cones State Bank on the corner with the one traffic light fairly easily. The gas station with the water fountain by the sidewalk was never in doubt. The Co-op and Creamery were around the corner from the bank. The Council Oak grocery store was caddycorner on the block with the butcher shop, and the Gamble's store that later became Pamida. The picture show was across the street from Steinkraus. Confusing our trip were the different locations of German's Market in the Thirties and the Sixties, and the construction of a new Post Office on Court Street. We slowly added in Dr. Deaver's office in the little gray house, the grain elevators, the depot, the lumber yard, Dairy Sweet, taverns, cafes, newspaper offices, Chevy dealer, and blacksmith.

Dad surprised me with the news that he had written up the football games for one Pierce newspaper. Since he was the PHS team manager, he had all the stats.

We finally determined that my dream hardware store was a real store at the east end of Main Street near the tracks and the post office. It was Lundak's Hardware at one point, and Magdanz Hardware at a different time. The mezzanine level was for the undertaker. The puzzle pieces are in place.