Most frugal friend/relative you've ever known

**steve-in-kville** · 10-02-2007, 08:41 PM

Gotta break the ice and start a thread, so here goes...

My wife *had* a great-uncle that lived to almost 100 y/o. He lived through the depression, and worked very hard all his life (as most people from that era did).

He lived by himself until he was 93. His electric bill NEVER went above $5/month... ever. During the winter, he lived in two first-floor rooms of a very large house. Kept perishable items in his garage. His entire cash savings was stashed in the house. He didn't trust banks a whole lot.

Anyone have an ancient relative or friend like this?

**mea772** · 10-02-2007, 08:46 PM

Wow!! That is something!

I don't know of any stories like that...wish I did tho!

**Laurie in Bradenton** · 10-02-2007, 08:50 PM

My Uncle Pete! He saved everything and was among the early dumpster divers. He made a living during the great depression going to the local dumps around Milwaukee. He collect up scrap and turn it in. He'd collect canning jars, clean them up and sell them to farm wives at the farmers markets. Nothing every got thrown away everything go saved and sold.
When he passed at 94 about 5 years ago he had 2 barns on his property full of all sorts of things. Everything carefully cleaned and sorted. Jars of nuts, bolts, buttons. Hundreds of hangers. Tons of old clothes in the process of being torn into strips and made into rag rugs.
The only thing he didn't save was love. He was always ready with a hug and a smile.

Miss him greatly.
Laurie in Bradenton

**jamie79** · 10-02-2007, 09:09 PM

My mother. She was a child of the depression. I remember as a kid she would take worn sheets and then cut them up and make pillow cases out of them. She could feed us kids with a can of tuna, a can of peas and some potatoes. She would tell us stories of when she was a kid during the depression and her dad had a farm and people would stop and ask for food. I lost my mom in May of 06 and these are some of the things that I think about and they make me smile

**cab54** · 10-02-2007, 10:17 PM

Your great-uncle-IL really wins the prize!

My maternal grandmother was our family frugal queen.

When she peeled apples for a pie, she cooked the peels down in water and made jelly out of it.

She saved bread wrappers and braided them into mats (rugs) for the back door.

Many more things too, I just can't think of them.

**sdrjeolsen** · 10-02-2007, 10:34 PM

When I was a kid, we had an elderly neighbor who never married. He hunted earth worms almost every night and sold honey & produce on the road side. He always wore the same clothes, drove a beater pick-up. He had gone through the depression and it showed. He lived in an old delapidated house & insulated it with newspapers & leaves. When he died, he left relatives over 3 million dollars.

we figured he had money because he owned a few parcels of land around the county. I always wondered why he couldn't enjoy his money, but now I understand that those who went through the depression had a hard time with things like that.

**JHudson04** · 10-02-2007, 10:39 PM

My former neighbor...an elderly gentleman who was quite eccentric. He was so obsessed with energy conservation that I would periodically have to go next door and knock to make sure he was still alive as it would be many, many nights with no sign of activity within his home. He refused to even turn so much as one light on! He'd go to bed when the sun went down! He told me once his wife had left him many years earlier as he would only let her take a cold shower every third day. Mind you, this was in a very affluent neighbhorhood and basic survival was not an issue.

**druidessemily** · 10-02-2007, 10:47 PM

Wow, these stories are very inspiring. Thank you for sharing!

**steve-in-kville** · 10-03-2007, 07:44 AM

Thanks for the replies.

heh, the same great uncle would remove the heater-core from his cars and trucks and connect the hoses. He would sell the heater core.

steve

**latierra84** · 10-03-2007, 07:46 AM

yeah! im loving these stories. keep them coming

**pip** · 10-03-2007, 08:31 AM

My mom. She grew up on a farm during the depression. She tells stories of one can of tuna feeding four people sandwiches for a week and moving to new apartments on the bus. She's still very careful with money and I am so thankful for her influence. It's a good thing to be able to make it on very little, especially if very little is what you have.

**Darlene** · 10-03-2007, 08:37 AM

My inlaws are the most frugal with themselves & generous with others. They both grew up in the depression and nothing is wasted. Still makes me smile to see how excited Dad is when he finds things along the side of the road. Everything is looked at and thought about at length as to "what else can I do with this". He looks kinda funny with his bright colored sneaker laces but wears them proudly because they were free, lol.
He likes to make penny bets and sometimes kicks it up a notch and bets a nickle or dime, lol.
Love them!

**mea772** · 10-03-2007, 09:05 AM

These are really neat to read!

**midwestgal** · 10-03-2007, 12:29 PM

It would be both sets of my grandparents, but I'll go with the paternal set here. They reared six boys during the depression, living in a little cottage they rented for $28/month in a midwest university city. This was the home my father grew up in and one I often visited until age 8, when it was torn down for university housing. There were 2 small bedrooms upstairs, which were unheated. The 6 boys shared one of these, sleeping in 3 double beds. There was very little plumbing--just a cold water tap in the kitchen and a toilet in the basement. Water was heated for bathing and household chores. (Baths were taken in a large galvanized tub in the back hall.) Only the expanding university could make my grandparents move from that cottage. The sons convinced them to buy a home of their own after this, and of course, they paid cash. Those 6 sons, and the grandchildren who remember, loved that little cottage.

**midwestgal** · 10-03-2007, 12:52 PM

I'm back! Here's a little tidbit about my maternal grandparents I wanted to share. They came from the farm to the same midwestern university city as young marrieds and had their 5 children there. They rented a string of apartment flats for about 16 years, always renting one of the bedrooms to a roomer for $1/week. Yes, you read that correctly! Even with all those children in tight places, they did that for years. All those dollars were saved for a down payment on a house that they moved into when Mom was 14. And it was a really nice Prairie craftsman style on a lovely shaded street that they kept up beautifully and were always proud of. They worked really hard to make a life for their family. Grandpa was scrappy. He would do things like go to grocery stores and buy their bruised fruit and veggies, and Grandma would can these. And yes, even in that home of their own, they always had a roomer. One, a single lady, stayed for over 20 years and was like one of the family. Mom remembers coming home from school as a child and telling her mom that "so-and-so has holes in her shoes." Her mother said to her, "Young lady, no one is as poor as you." But the kids never felt it because their parents were just so clever and hard working, and they felt secure.