Senior Spotlight: Lillian Laws of Thompson Falls

Lillian Laws was born December 17, 1924, in Bigfork, Minnesota. "My dad was Harry Henry Gravelle. My mom was a LaBlanc. Both of their families were from France, then migrated to Quebec. My mom never learned to speak English," Laws said. Her grandfather was a Native American agent for the Cree Nation.

Lillian's family moved to North Dakota to farm. The locusts came and destroyed everything, she recalls. "We went to my mom's brother's home in Sandpoint, Idaho. My uncle Arthur was a dray line delivery driver. The dray wagons were the heaviest and were pulled by draft horses. We had a brief stay there before moving to Priest River near Pend Oreille Lake."

Laws said that the Italians lived on one side of the river and all other immigrants lived on the other. "Dad bought land and built a house. The houses there only had a kitchen and bedrooms. The roofs were high pitched because of all the snow. We were six kids living in the house without electricity or plumbing."

"Dad had an accident with a log drive that broke his back. He was six feet tall but after that he was five feet tall. My mom didn't speak English, so people made fun of us. They called dad a humpback and said mom was dumb. We were no dummies," Laws said.

The school was in the "Little Italy" area. "We walked there every day and had boys harass us. Mom finally had enough empty Karo syrup buckets to make our lunch pails out of. I have four sisters and one brother, Fredlin who is the middle child. Those Italian boys started a fight with him one day so my sisters and I weighed in with our buckets and beat the tar out of those boys!" Laws added that, "we got a lot of respect for doing that. But mom was yelling at us in French for denting our new lunch buckets."

Laws recalled another incident with the Italian boys. "My sisters and I had a special swimming hole. One day when we were going to go swimming we saw that the boys were there. We knew that they would not be nice to us. We happened to see where a den of baby snakes was nearby so we each grabbed a snake and ran those boys off. We made it clear that they were not welcome. It haunts me still because I hate snakes!"

Laws recalled that her dad had to take her and her siblings swimming because her mother couldn't swim. "Mom couldn't swim a stroke. She scolded us in French. We shortened her life."

Laws said there were six kids and her parents in their small house. "We finally got two chairs big enough so the two youngest kids could sit on mom's lap and the older ones in dad's lap. They would sing to us in French. My mom could dance. We all learned to dance. I love music! It is great therapy for the body."

In the summertime the Gravelle children never had shoes to wear. "We hit the ground running with our tough feet and didn't know any different." Laws related a story about winter footwear. "We had to walk a little over a mile to school. In the wintertime to walk through the snow we wrapped our feet in gunny sacks over our shoes. School was on a hill above the bridge that we had to cross. When we got to the bridge we would tie the gunny sacks with twine to the underside to keep them hidden and dry, and so we wouldn't get teased by the other students."

"I loved school," Laws said. The only time she missed school was when she had a migraine. One year was really special for Lillian. In the eighth grade a high school teacher came to listen to her class sing. "I was chosen to sing in the high school choir. I loved it!" Laws recalls that the choir went to Lewiston, Idaho to perform. "I didn't have the money to go, but that year I was given the leading role in the cantata, "My Name is Trouble". What a wonderful year." That year she was chosen salutatorian and gave a speech. "I got my first bought dress. No leftovers. It was pretty pink with puffy sleeves pink on the top and blue on the bottom. And I got new brown shoes. I wore them for graduation. Two teachers gave me presents." Laws said she had to write her own speech and she did not know that it was an honor to be chosen as a woman until later. "I would have been nervous had I known."

"When I finally weighed over a hundred pounds I could donate blood. I was awarded for a gallon donated," Laws said. "I was always for the underdog," she said. The first job she had, Laws said she walked over a mile to a place on Saturdays to scrub floors, cook the noon meal and iron clothes. "I was 14 years old and got paid 50 cents for an eight-hour day." Laws said she saved 25 cents and gave her brother 25 cents for gas. Her 25 cents paid for school paper. "I got to go to high school for two years. They didn't educate girls beyond two years. Sixteen was when high school was done."

"Dad's first time filing income taxes was when FDR was president. I saw FDR at the train stop in Priest River, Idaho, when I was still in school."

Laws said back then they didn't always have a choice on who they married. Her first husband was from Idaho and went into the service. Vernon Dale White was drafted. She had a son and a daughter. Laws said that she didn't see a doctor until she was 8 months pregnant with her son, Lenny. "My husband came back from the war with PTSD. He kept taking off, leaving me to take care of our children." Laws explained that if he had been taken care of she wouldn't have had to leave him.

Laws married a neighbor in the 50's who she had known since her first marriage. They moved to Thompson Falls in 1962 from Spirit Lake, Idaho. "I recall all the stores that were here when we arrived. There were three grocery stores in town, a five-and-dime and a Chevy dealership."

After working years in logging camp kitchens baking for loggers on a wood stove, Laws said she has enjoyed baking and crocheting doilies and blankets in her Montana home. "Maple bars and bear claws were some of my specialties, but then I became known for my popcorn balls on Halloween." One year Laws said she made 299 popcorn balls to hand out. "Carloads would show up." She had to pay attention to who she was giving them to because kids would go home and change so they could get another one. "I could tell by their voices if they had been by already," Laws recalled.

Lillian's Popcorn Balls

Laws shared her famous popcorn ball recipe:

4 cups sugar

1 cup butter

1-1/3 cup white corn syrup

1-1/3 cup water

2 cups unpopped corn

3 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. salt

Put sugar, corn syrup, water, butter and salt in a large saucepan. Cook, stirring until dissolved. Then continue cooking until mixture forms a ball in cold water. Add vanilla. Makes about 30 popcorn balls.