FAMILY

            Valentine and Teresa Rottler lived at the corner of Third and Roberts streets in Ste. Genevieve.  The oldest boy, also named Valentine, but went by Pat.  There were three girls, Ruth, Verneal and Betty.  Robert was born March 13, 1930 and Thomas came seven years later.  Dad had lots of stories about his childhood, making it sound pretty carefree - something like Tom Sawyer.  One was about his sister and cousin Bernadine Pinkley sneaking some cigarettes and gave him one to smoke.  When the parents came to catch them, the girls disappeared, leaving little Bobby to face the music.  He talked about tagging along with Grandma White, a black lady who was a midwife.  He would haul her gear around in his wagon. 

 

            His dad worked as a brewmaster at the old Ste. Genevieve Brewery just down the street, but that came to an end with Prohibition.  Then he was the custodian at the county courthouse.   That might be the connection that led to young Bobby bringing meals ( or a meal) to a condemned prisoner at the county jail.  This apparently was the fellow who was the last man hanged for murder in the state of Missouri.   Valentine was considerably older than Teresa and he died in 1942.   Obviously, this led to a number of consequences.  Everyone but little Tom went to work.  Pat was in the Navy.  The girls waited tables.  Dad made it to his freshman year at Valle when, one day the nun in charge called him in and kicked him out for lack of tuition payments.   Grandma Rottler cooked for other families and took in laundry as well.

            Dad found time to excel in the Boy Scouts.  He was in Troop 404 and was the troop's second Eagle Scout.  He got to go to Philmont camp in New Mexico.  There are two stories related to Philmont.  In one, his burro drank all the water and all Dad had was Spam - he never ate Spam again.  In the other, he and another scout were very hungry (one story and the other may dovetail) and came upon some kind of a cabin, where they found a pan of peach cobbler, which they ate.