Valentine's day in Cincinnati, circa 1953

For the longest time, I thought I had the stereotypical sweet grandmother, the kind who gave her grandchildren unlimited sweets and never yelled, and was perfectly sweet and kind in every way. To be fair, I never heard Grandma Kathleen yell (even when she was upset!) and my siblings and I were always delighted by the amount of sweets and other treats we got while we were at her house. Grandma made visiting her home truly magical for us kids.

When we would talk about it with her as adults, she would say, "Well, you don't know; I'm not actually all sugar and spice!" We didn't believe her, even after she told us about devious plans that she'd come up with in the past--that never came to pass.

Until ONE day, we found out that she sent mean Valentine's to Granddad and his roommates!

Grandma was living at the YWCA in Cincinnati, and Granddad was attending the University of Cincinnati. They were living close enough that they could see each other. Granddad says that Grandma even came over at one point and cooked a meal for everyone to share.

Jerry (1951), Kathleen (1952)

Grandma had a brilliant idea. Months in advance, she prepared cards to send to Granddad and each of his roommates, and sent them home with her roommates during Christmastime. Why, you may ask? To throw them off the scent! Each of Grandma's roommates sent the card from her own hometown.

So when mean Valentine's cards started arriving for Granddad and his roommates from seemingly unrelated places in Ohio and Indiana, Granddad and his roommates were perplexed. 

When retelling the story, Granddad said, "The cards started out with something that looked nice and then got right nasty when you opened them up."

Granddad received this one "signed" by his cousin and roommate, Dave Grupenhoff:

Me thinketh

Thee stinketh

Another one that came in, also "signed" by the roommate of the recipient:

I would climb the highest mountain

I would swim the deepest sea

just to get 

away from thee.

I can imagine Granddad and his roommates' confusion, and Grandma struggling to keep a straight face while he tells her the riddle of the mean Valentine's cards. "How could this be happening?" Granddad and his roommates must have wondered out loud.

Granddad reminisced, "When the culprit finally confessed, we all could imagine she and her friends just sitting around and laughing at our confusion." 

He and Grandma both get a good laugh out of it now.