One Hot August Afternoon

One hot August afternoon, probably around 1927, the kids had gathered at the swimming hole there in North Dakota. 'Freed from church,' it was time for some fun.

The Titanic had long settled on the bottom of the Atlantic, the problem with exposure to gas during the war had mostly died out, and America's 'Teddy Bear' was but lore and history. That day would be of no danger to those whose day had already passed.

Young Cyril jumped into that swimming hole, and didn't come up for a while. It was the most dangerous day in the history of the world - at least from Cyril's perspective. It was a sad day for his family, but it wasn't anybody else's 'most dangerous day;' at least nobody in their family or sight.

In Chicago that day, a child got caught up in some cross-fire. No one was aiming at her; it just happened for no rhyme or reason. In Kansas, a father misjudged the speed of the train, and he, his wife, and their four children are all killed at the intersection. In London, a lamp is tipped over, and three children die in the resultant fire.

The lineage ends for those children, and, in Kansas, for the parents, too.

In many other places, families gathered to pay final respects to great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers.

The lineage continued.

Today, families gathered to pay final respects to great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers, who were only babies on the world's most dangerous day for Cyril; the day they were taken to the funeral so their parents could pay their final respects to their grandparents.

Today, there are no families to gather for those children who died that hot August afternoon in North Dakota.

The story has been over for them for decades.

Learn more about this author, Tom Koecke.
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