Emerson E. Palmer

Emerson Palmer was one of four children. When he was in HS (Bath Township/Osborne, Ohio) he played the saxophone and marimba or xylophone. When the Palmers were living in Osborne they lived on Mann Avenue in a brick house with a large front porch. My dad met his wife (my mother) Gertrude when she began working as the Home Economics Teacher and Lunch Room Operator, planning menus for the cafeteria and taking care of the business end of the lunchroom at the same school where he was teaching. She used to pass his room where the door was open and the two of them would exchange glances. Students teased them about their possible "relationship:. After they married they moved to Lovington Arms apartments. where their first child Sue Ellen was born. When the US began to get involved in WWII, Emerson enlisted (not waiting to be drafted with his 1A status). He Left his job at Bath Township Schools, had his physical and was then rejected because he had been diagnosed with high blood pressure. (It was later confirmed by his family physician Dr. Winans that he did not have high blood pressure after all.) Since he had already given notice that he would be leaving his job when he learned that he could not enlist, he tried to go back to his teaching position. The position had been filled and the school would not/could not rehire him.

It took my dad a while to procure the job at The Southwestern Portland Cement Company in Fairborn; but when he did, with no car to drive, he had to walk a considerable distance to and from work every day.

Emerson had always had an interest in and a great love for cars. We have a multitude of photos of him alone or with family in front of various automobiles from early on. Because of the circumstances of his rejection by the Enlistment Board, he was promised by the local car dealer to receive the first automobile to arrive in Fairborn after the end of the war. The first automobile to come into town for sale after the war was saved for him and he purchased that auto.

He loved his family. Each Sunday evening he would go to the School Board building where he had the use of a typewriter and would type a letter to his mother. His father had done the same for many years, sending circular letters to all of his children. Unfortunately those letters my father wrote seem to have been lost or discarded.

He had always wanted to take his family on a vacation. But because he worked two jobs and had little free time, that never happened. He did however take us to his parents’ farm in Waterloo Indiana - often leaving some of us there for a week or so while he went back to work. He loved the farm as much as his brothers and sisters did. We would go there with the rest of the Palmer family every Christmas - filling the house with family fun and wonderful food.

My father was known for his wonderful sense of humor. He was quite open-minded as was my mother. They would often sit at the dinner table after the family meal was ended and talk about what was happening in the local area or the world. My bits of what was being said. We learned a lot about their moral values and had many of those instilled in us through "osmosis" and their example.

Emerson E. Palmer was elected Fairborn Man of the year. Newspaper articles about that follow. He also had a school in Fairborn named after him - Emerson E. Palmer Elementary School