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"I've been hoping that the church would still be there, and taken care of. My children and I lived in an apartment on Oak St in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It took a while, but I started noticing the neighborhood and putting things together - the flowers, the Furuta house (and Mr. Furuta, who was pretty nice unless the neighborhood kids chased the frogs around his ponds), and a few frame houses left from the ones that must have been here since the early 1900s.
When I finally found the plaque on the church, it all fell into place. I'm a Presbyterian, and when I saw that marker I could almost see the church as it was, surrounded by homes and farms and flowers...
"I remember a house that had been abandoned for quite a while, farther south and by the railroad tracks. There were still clothesline supports--the old-fashioned kind--in the back yard, and fruit trees, and I looked inside to see beautiful built-in cabinets with beveled glass doors, and closely fitted hardwood floors. I think it was torn down; I tried not to know, or to go by there after a while for fear of what I would, or wouldn't, see."