My grandmother was talking about a story that she really liked from the Saturday Evening Post. I know she said it was from the mid to late 1950s. She didn’t remember the author, and now I can’t remember much about the story, but I would like to see if I can find it and send it to her for Christmas as a surprise. Even if I can’t find the original Saturday Evening Post the story itself would be fine.
All I can really remember is she said it was about a boy and his family, most likely during the Great Depression, who were traveling in the Midwest and Upper Midwest, the Dakotas, Nebraska and the like. She said that the boy had a couple of pets, one was a dog and the other was an owl that came along with them and rode in the rumble seat.
Other then that I can’t remember anything. For some reason I remember this story from somewhere, but it’s possible that she told me a couple of times and I just didn’t pay attention. Hopefully someone can help.
Could it be the 1961 book Owls in the Family by Farley Mowat? The family drives a Model A car with a rumble seat. The story in the Post in the late '50s may have been a portion of what later became a book.
Mowat is best known for his memoir Never Cry Wolf, about living with arctic wolves, which became a Disney film. This about the author says Mowat has been published in The Saturday Evening Post.
I’ve been investigating Mowat too, and I wonder if it couldn’t also be “The Dog Who Wouldn’t Be,” which has at least one chapter that mentions two pet owls. From chapter 13, “Owls Underfoot”:
This is just one chapter in the book, but it’s conceivable that it might have been excerpted or serialized in the Saturday Evening Post. The copyright date is 1957.
Mowat, Farley. “Pals of My Childhood.” Saturday Evening Post, 4/13/1957, Vol. 229 Issue 41, p36-138, 5p.
It seems to be an excerpt from Scarlett67’s book there - the same passage is in this. I’ll have our database e-mail you the PDF, though, in case you’d like to give it to her exactly as she saw it with ads and such. Shoulda known which one to try first when I searched the Saturday Evening Post for “owl” and “rumble” and got 10 Boys Own Adventure-type stories and one cute one about owls by an author already mentioned in the thread, if I’d been reading for content.
ETA - FYI, Edward, expect it to come from ephost@epnet.com and check your spam folder if you don’t get it.
ETAA - I also sent you the cover, thinking she might like that.
I believe that’s it. I also got the emails, thank you. I might try and find one on eBay, which I have seen, though a bit pricey. I might also pick up the book, she loves to read. I knew there was a reason I read the boards.
Oh, those were two of my favorite books when I was a kid! The quote about the gopher is even better when you discover that the auther had been sneaking in a little dissection during a boring dinner, with guests. He’d snuck the gopher in on a saucer and was happily working away on it. His dad made the mistake of asking what young Farley was doing. Oops!
