Page 20--SUSQUEHANNA BULLETIN
Adam and Eve
W hile presiding over the
first autumn meeting of the
student council at Elizabeth-
town High School in 1958,
the eye of the President,
John Larry Biesecker, fell
upon ‘‘a cute little sopho-
more’’ who had just been
elected to the council.
In order to get to know
her, President Biesecker
appointed the cute sopho-
more, whose name was
Nancy Johnson, to a commi-
tee of which he was
chairman.
It wasn’t until the follow-
ing February, however,
Saturday, February 28,
1959, to be exact, that John
got around to taking Nancy
out on a date in his 1953
blue Plymouth. They went
to Lancaster to see the new
movie, ‘‘Rally 'Round the
Flag, Boys.”
Donegal Fish and Conservation Ass’n.
Last Monday evening,
May 12, about twenty-
five members of the Done-
gal Fish and Conservation
Association stocked the Do-
negal Creek with rainbow
trout. They used the method
of float stocking which
distributes the fish evenly
along the course of the
stream. The fish are gather-
ed by nets from the
nursery, placed in buckets,
carried to a iarge tank on a
truck, then transported to
the creek, taken from the
tank in buckets and poured
into screened boxes in the
stream. A couple men then
walk down the stream,
towing the screened box
with them and allowing the
fish to slip into the" stream
| i
Johri and Nancy Bicsecker
Nancy was very-impress-
ed by being taken out by the
president of the student
council and had doubts
about whether she was just
a passing fancy or not - until
on the following Monday
she saw John waiting for her
by her locker at school.
They started seeing each
other regularly.
Late in the spring of 1959
they were out together on a
biological bug hunting ex-
pedition when they got
caught in a downpour of
rain. John suggested they
go to his place in Locust
Grove, where Nancy could
meet his mother.
Nancy, soaked and be-
draggled by the rain, was
afraid of the first impression
she would make on John’s
mother.
one by one.
All in all, the Associa-
tion stocked about a mile
and a half of the Donegal.
Each box was towed through
the stream about a half-
mile.
The Association rears
the fish which it stocks at its
hatchery and nursery. Presi-
dent is Ken Depoe, Vice-
President, Gerald Grove,
and Secretary-Treasurer,
Brubaker.
Purpose of the organi-
zation is the preservation of
trout and of streams for
trout. Membership in the
Association is $2 a year.
Anyone interested in joining
can do so by calling any
member of officer.
But as soon as she met
Odessa Biesecker who had
gone to her garden to do
some weeding when the rain
started and who was even
more bedraggled and mud-
died than Nancy, Nancy
relaxed and felt welcome
immediately by John’s fami-
ly - and has ever since.
John graduated that year
from high school and enlist-
ed right afterwards in the
Navy. He says now that he
had courted Nancy ‘‘to have
someone to write to while in
the Navy.” He was not
disappointed; at least at
first, Nancy wrote to him
every day.
All through his three
years in the Navy John and
Nancy kept in close touch by
writing and seeing each
other as often as possible.
John spent a lot of time in a
submarine in the North
Atlantic, out of touch not
only with Nancy but with all
the rest of the world. He
read and studied a lot in the
sub, and during brief
periods when the sub was
surfaced he would gaze at
icebergs and think deeply
about the world.
While John was away in
the Navy Nancy had a few
dates with other fellows, but
they were only ‘‘polite
dates.’’ John too, although a
sailor, says he was ‘‘true
blue.”
Toward the end of his
service he came home
frequently, due to an injury.
Nancy and John’s father
would always be waiting for
him at the train station in
Lancaster. :
Out of the service, he at
first intended to pursue an
early ambition to be a state
policeman, but Nancy
thought he had other poten-
tial, and urged him to go to
college. Nancy herself was
studying to be a medical
technician at Elizabethtown
College.
John enrolled as a part-
time student at Elizabeth-
town.
They were planning thei
lives together, and in March
1964, they were married.
Coincindentally, on their
wedding night the show on
‘“Sunday night at the
Movies’’ was ‘‘Rally "Round
the Flag, Boys,”” the same
movie they had gone to see
on their first date five years
before.
They did not watch the
movie a second time.
They settled down now to
a life that was both arduous
and complicated. Nancy was
working at St. Joseph’s
Hospital in Lancaster as a
medical technician, and
John had transferred to
Millersville State College.
He was also working full-
time in Grinnell’s Foundry
Wa
in Columbia.
They lived in a cramped
little arpartment on Orange
Street in Lancaster, which
was a hot and noisy place for
John to try to sleep as he
had to in the daytime.
Sometimes John and
Nancy would not see each
other for days, although
they were living in the same
place. They’d leave notes
for each other in a little
notebook in the kitchen.
Before John finished at
Millersville their daughter
Amy was born, and their
schedules became more
complex.
At last, in 1967 John was
graduated from Millersville
and took a job teaching
social studies and coaching
football and track at Hano-
ver High School. Nancy,
who was pregnant, never-
theless attended every foot-
ball game. The Bieseckers’
son Johnnie was born while
they were in Hanover.
Life seemed settled at
last, but not for long.
John had an opportunity
for a grant to do graduate
study in social work at the
University of Maryland, and
after one year of teaching
resumed his studies.
He and Nancy took an
apartment in Elizabethtown,
and John shuttled between
an intern’s job with the
Bureau of Children’s Ser-
vice in Lancaster and
attending classes at the
University of Maryland. At
Maryland his roommate was
an Episcopal priest.
After two years he recei-
ved his master’s degree in
social work and took a
permanent position with the.
Bureau of Children’s Ser-
vice. At the same time
Nancy and John bought a
house near Maytown and
began to lead a more settled
life than before with Amy
and Johnnie.
Stocks Creek
Bob Zeler Bob Zeller and Bob Brubaker with a box of trout,
May 21, 1975
John has moved to a new
position as Child Welfare
Specialist with the Regional
Office of Services to Chil-
dren in Harrisburg.
From their first date John
and Nancy have been
communicating well with
each other. But, their
communication continues to
improve.
Nancy has learned to
express anger more readily,
get it out of her system,
instead of letting it build up
unexpressed. Then, reason-
able discussions and solu-
tions of problems follow.
The Bieseckers continue
to plan a new future
"together. They want more
children, but in today’s
over-populated world John
daily sees children whc
desperately need homes.
John and Nancy plan to
adopt children.
Occasionally, John and
Nancy get out the notebook
in which they used to write
notes to-each other when
they lived in that cramped
little apartment on Orange
Street and re-read their
communications.
The marriage of John
and Nancy Biesecker has
been built on communica-
tion, the sharing of meaning
between two people who
mean much to each other.
Mayor Scott
in Bainbridge
Richard M. Scott, May-
or of Lancaster, will be
principal speaker at Memo-
rial Day Services sponsored
by Libhart-Dyer Post 197
American Legion and Auxil-
iary in Bainbridge on
Saturday, May 31.
A parade will start at 9
A.M. at Bainbridge Elem- .
entary School. Bainbridge
Band will provide the music.
A Memorial Service is
scheduled for 9:30 A.M. at
the Bainbridge Cemetery.
Mayor Scott, who is a
Brigadier General, U.S.A.
ret., will speak at the
ceremonies, which will be
conducted by the Legion.
Rev. Charles A. Snyder of
Baingridge, will officiate.
Dawn Marie Nauman,
Bainbridge fifth grader, will
read her own essay on
Americanism, which won
first prize in a contest
sponsored by the Auxiliary.
DID YOU HEAR...
Philip M. Horst, junior
mathematics major, 209
Marietta ave., Mt. Joy, has
been named to the ‘‘Dean’s
List‘‘ at Eastern Mennonite
College in Harrisonburg,
Va., with perfect 4.0 grade
point averages for the
winter term.