This is an unusual post, so I'll try to set it up briefly. This is from back when I was a kid. My Mom's side of the family, in Oklahoma (or nearabouts), has always been quite close. But with my Mom & Dad on the east coast, how to keep up the traditional holiday family gathering?
Visiting for Christmas was not really an option (although we did visit in summers). And long-distance telephone calls were still expensive. In the days before cassette tapes, there were small reel-to-reel tape players. So in a family pod-cast-like fashion, the folks in Oklahoma would make recordings on these tape players when they were all together and send them in the mail to my family in Virginia.
These audio files are from one tape recorded on Christmas Day 1967. (I spliced it up to be a bit more manageable.) The whole family with the exception of us Willises were in my Grandparent's house in Corn, OK. My Grandparents were pretty devout Mennonite, which would explain the prayers. Not sure what interest there is here if you're not family, but give it a listen. Although the recordings are from 1967, it actually hearkens back to a time well before that.
