Family Thanksgiving
My great-grandfather, August Schlafly, arrived at the Port of New Orleans in 1849 along with his parents and multiple siblings. They had fled their birthplace in a canton outside Bern, Switzerland, to escape violent anti-Catholic religious persecution rampant in many parts of Europe.
The family boarded a riverboat travelling northward on the Mississippi and finally settled in Carlyle, Illinois, not far from St. Louis. As his legacy, August proceeded to build or purchase a number of unique businesses over the ensuing decades, which he turned over to his sons, including my grandfather.
By the time I arrived over a century later, many family members had migrated to St. Louis and had become embedded in the community. Like the Pilgrims, this immigrant family embraced the Thanksgiving tradition and celebrated the freedoms and opportunities offered by life in America. In short, Thanksgiving was a big deal. Members of all branches of the family attended, which meant that seating for well over 100 people was required.
The old Bellerive Country Club, now the campus of UMSL, provided the Schlafly Thanksgiving venue in the early to mid-1950’s. My grandfather and his brothers and sisters presided over the festivities. Befitting a Swiss-German clan such as ours, certain formal traditions had taken hold. The most terrifying to a young child, and probably to most others, was the rite of Introduction and Identification of oneself to the assembled group of family members.
To a young boy like me, already nearly paralyzed by the sheer size of the Bellerive dining room and the 100+ family members dressed in suits and fancy dresses, the prospect of standing up solo and announcing my name and who my parents were was terrifying. One by one, family members rose around me to greet the large group as I desperately counted the number left before my turn arrived.
I kept rehearsing: “My name is Joe Schlafly, and I am the oldest son of Edward and Julia Schlafly.” I knew all too well from the hoary legend that, over the years, certain family members had erred in their presentations, which generated both uproarious laughter and stupefying embarrassment. For example, young girls had arisen to announce that they were “sons” of so and so; young boys would rise and, in sheer panic, forget the formal names of their parents. One newlywed bride, and new to the family, once stood and identified herself as the “husband” of my cousin Tom, which brought the house down.
After an eternity, the rhythm of the introductions finally settled at my feet. Shaking, I stood and uttered the magic words of Schlafly family identification. The wave passed on as I collapsed into my chair, having performed apparently without incident.
Other than surviving my debut, my favorite Thanksgiving memory took place many years later after the third generation had assumed control. In a provocative bit of in-lawing, my cousin Fred Schlafly married Phyllis, who was already quite a political activist. I should stress that, by this time in the Schlafly clan's growth, political views varied dramatically.
On this particularly beautiful Thanksgiving day, Fred welcomed everyone in his role as the oldest member of his generation. He then paused for a moment and announced that Phyllis could not attend the holiday festivities that day as she was in Rome. Fred then looked at his watch and proclaimed: “In fact, at this very moment, Phyllis is having an audience with the Pope”!
Big Dan Schlafly, as I called him, who was Fred’s younger brother and whose politics could not have been more polar, was unable to restrain himself. He jumped to his feet and shouted, “What is she TELLING him”! The room exploded in laughter, revelling in the spectacle of sibling rivalry delivered with humor. We had a great deal for which to be thankful.