Spiegle in his home studio, 2003. Photo via the Humboldt Historian.

EDITOR’S NOTE from 2003: Dan Spiegle graduated from Fortuna High School in 1939, and served in the U.S. Navv from 1942-46. Following a four-year education at Chouinard Art Institute, Los Angeles, he created the “Hopalong Cassidy” comic strip. Later, Dan illustrated children’s books, comic books and coloring books for Disney. DC Comics, Marvel Comics, Whitman and Gold Key. In the past decade, he took over “Terry and the Pirates” for the Chicago Tribune Syndicate. Now, he illustrates “Classic Tales” for Boys Life. Dan and his wife of fifty-six years, Marie, live and work in Carpintería, California. — Humboldt Historian

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Our family was living in Hawaii when the crash came in ‘29. Like everyone, my father, who had sold his drugstore and retired, lost just about everything, but he was able to scrape up enough money to get us to San Francisco, buy a car, and start looking for a small ranch. Having grown up on a farm in Ohio, he felt we could ride out the Depression if we had a place where we could grow our own vegetables and raise some chickens.

We looked at property in Petaluma, Santa Rosa, Ukiah and then worked our way north to Eureka. There, my father and mother rented an apartment. Each day, they would drive around the area, leaving my sister, my brother and me in the apartment. We were overjoyed when they finally found a seven-acre farm in McKinleyville. Three kids in an apartment wasn’t fun. We bought a cow (my job was milking her morning and evenings), several calves, a goat, some rabbits and a few hundred pullets. We were ready for life on a farm! Of course, it wasn’t that simple, but with the help and suggestions from friendly neighbors, we bungled along until we got the hang of it.

Starting school in the country — when you’re from the city — can be traumatic. The first thing our dear teacher did was stand us up in front of the classroom (fifth through eighth grades together) and say, “Now, I want to introduce Géraldine and Danny from Honolulu, Hawaii. Please make them feel welcome.” Wrong thing to say! The girls weren’t so bad with my sister, but the boys “pantsed” me during the first recess and hung my Levis out to dry on the front fence. My best friend was Rollie (1 can’t remember his last name). His folks were Swedish and owned a large farm near us. Rollie and I would go hunting with our BB guns. We’d lie on our backs in the field and shoot up at hawks perching in the very tall, dead trees. I don’t think a BB can reach that far, but we didn’t care. We felt we could do anything.

Fishing and climbing over fallen logs on Mill Creek was a favorite pastime. Another was finding golf balls up at the golf course and selling them back to the club. When Rollie first took me up to hunt for balls, he didn’t bother to explain that you only pick up the ones that aren’t rolling. I didn’t return to the club until I was sure they wouldn’t remember me.

Even though we all enjoyed the farm, our father missed the pharmacy. He used to relieve the druggists at different pharmacies in Arcata and Eureka so he could keep up on the newest drugs. Then, a small drug store in Loleta became available.

We loved Loleta and the people.

After we moved there, my sister entered Fortuna High School, and I followed two years later and joined the band that went on the historic trip to San Francisco in 1937 for the opening of the Golden Gate Bridge.

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