Autobiography of Robert James Hardie (1996); Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 

Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Vince Summers 
[vsummers@gmail.com].  Permission given by author for use in USGenWeb Archives.

Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/pafiles.htm
************************************************

             Robert James Hardie, An Autobiography

  I, Robert James Hardie, eldest of four sons of Augustus Brunner
Hardie and Gertrude Bell Johnson, was born Tuesday, February 13,
1917 at 5:15 AM in the Calumet & Arizona Hospital, Douglas,
Cochise County, Arizona.
  Since both my father's and my mother's families were natives of
Philadelphia, Pa, my birth so far away from my progenitor's base
of birth and livelihood was a first insofar as the male side of
our families were concerned.
  My father was born in Philadelphia, Pa., 16 January 1886 at
3:30 AM - son of Robert James Hardie and Mary Madeleine Burrows.
My father was the 3rd child and second son of 5 children born to
Robert & Mary Hardie. They were Sarah, Robert, Augustus, Madeleine,
and Jessie.
  The Hardies - at least our branch - had originated [in] Scotland
approximately in the 1740's when Captain Robert Hardie had
apparently emigrated from Scotland to America, and had settled,
first in Bristol above Philadelphia, and later in Philadelphia
proper, in the Southwark District.  Captain Hardie was the owner
and captain of various merchant ships.  Some of his various vessels
are on record in the volumes of the "Pennsylvania Archives" series
of Pennsylvania's Official Records.  They are also listed in the
Ship's Logs - sole remaining - privately owned by his family.  Two
of these volumes are available in his own handwriting, and cover
a period [from] 1758-1798.
  In the beginning of the American Revolution, he volunteered his
services to the fledgling Pennsylvania Navy and was appointed,
first, Captain of the fire boat "Terror," and subsequently to the
armed boat, "Burke."  The latter is cited by his Citation as
'Captain of the Armed Boat "Burke"' and signed by the Chairman of
the Pa. Local Authority, Thomas Wharton.  This certificate has
been in the family until recently, when it was placed on file at
the Historical Society of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pa. for
safe-keeping.  These events are cited at length in the "Pennsylvania
Archives."
  Robert Hardie left a Bible listing his 9 children by his second
wife, Martha Cowgill, who he had married 26 April 1767, Gloria Dei
Church, Philadelphia - born 1745, and died 1795.
  His son and sole survivor of his children, Captain David Hardie,
followed in his footsteps and was also a sea captain.  Records of
his voyages - bringing some immigrants from Europe to the United
States - are included in the series of books by Rupp, setting forth
these immigrants.  He also served in the War of 1812.  His eldest
son, Robert III, also served in the War of 1812 on a privateer.
His service on this is commemorated by his desire to obtain a
pension and his papers, which are on file at the Veteran's Office
in Washington, cites his service. Unfortunately for him, his
pension was denied because of his service on a privateer - not a
federal vessel.  He was a prisoner of war in the infamous jail in
England, Dartmoor, until his release in 1815.  His youngest brother,
James Gustavus, is our progenitor.
  My mother was born 28 August 1892, in St. Paul, Minnesota - the
second daugher and third child of Oscar Soffe Johnson and Jane Bell
Kite.  Oscar and Jane Johnson had five children: William, Mildred,
Gertrude, Harold, and Charles.  The two youngest died in early
childhood.
  My mother's family through her mother, Jane Bell Kite, were among
the earliest settlers in Philadelphia, through James Kite, the
progenitor in America of this branch of the Kite family who married
Mary Warner, daughter of William Warner, one of William Penn's first
asssociated judges at the founding of the Colony in 1682, but who
had preceded the Founder, and had settled in what was later to be a
section of Philadelphia known as Blockley - today's West Philadelphia,
as early as the 1650's-1660's, under a 'permit' from the Swedish and
Indian predecessors of Penn.
  My mother's father, Oscar Soffe Johnson, was born in Philadelphia
- his father's family apparently had moved from southern New Jersey -
his mother from England.
  My siblings are Augustus Brunner, David John Stevenson, and Charles
Hare, all married with progeny.  Augustus and Charles [are] now
deceased.
  From approximately May 1916 until June 1917, my parents lived in
Arizona - site of my birth.  My father was a mechanical engineer,
installing a copper smelter for the "Diamond Copper Queen" division
of the Phelps-Dodge Corp. in or near Bisbee, Arizona.
  At the termination of my father's project, he moved his family
through San Francisco (as a side trip) back to Philadelphia.  From
approximately September 1917 through October 1918, we lived in
Talladega, Alabama, where I have pictures of our home.  From October
1918 to early 1919, we lived in Lebanon, Pa.
  In the fall of 1919, my father served his employment with the firm
of contracting engineers, and accepted the position of sales manager
for the Baldwin Locomotive Works, covering Colombia, Panama, Ecuador,
Peru, and Chile, and assistant manager for the west coast of South
America, which included Argentina and Bolivia.
  In 1919 he moved his family to Lima, Peru, which he established as
his headquarters.  There, on 20 March 1920, Augustus Brunner Jr., my
first brother, was born.
  In mid-1921 we moved from Lima, Peru, to Santiago, Chile, where we
lived for approximately 9 months.  We moved from there in early 1922
to Bogota, Columbia, [to] which my father had relocated his
headquarters.  Here we were joined by my 2nd brother, David John
Stevenson, 20 August 1924, at home in the suburban town of Chapinero,
now an integral part of Bogota.
  In Bogota, I started my formal schooling, attending the "Gimnasio
Moderno," a private school for boys, where I spent my first [four]
grades learning [while] speaking Spanish only, which was to be my
downfall, since my parents felt that I should learn my native tongue.
In 1927, my brother Brunner and I were consigned to the Haverford
School, in Haverford, Pa., in suburban Philadelphia.  Here we stayed
until 1931, although the rest of the family were still in Colombia.
  That year, 1927, we were joined by our third brother, Charles Hare,
born 11 August 1927 [at the] Hahnemann Hospital in Philadelphia - the
only native son of a native son, and the only son to be born in
Philadelphia proper.
  In early 1928, my family, except for Brunner and I, returned to
Bogota, Colombia.  My mother and two younger brothers stayed there
until the following year, leaving my father to return, finally, in
1931.  Due to many changes in the railroading industry, the Baldwin
Works [fell] into bankruptcy, terminating my father's employment.
Meanwhile, we had settled in Ardmore, Pa., where, after four years
at the Haverford School, where I had mastered the English language,
I entered the Lower Merion school system for [three] years.
  As happened to so many of us during the Great Depression, I had to
leave my regular high school education to get a job; however, I
completed my high school education at Temple University High School
at night, while working at the Autocar Co., manufacturers of trucks,
now a division of the White Motor Co., of Cleveland, Ohio, first as a
mail boy and messenger, and then as a cost-accountant.
  In 1938, graduating from High School, with honors in science, I
started my college education at the University of Pennsylvania,
Wharton School, School of Accounts and Finance.  WOrking during the
day, and going to classes at night made the time go fast.  My major
was in foreign trade and ocean shipping - minor in accounting - until
I received my notice [of] induction into the armed services.  This
took precedence as it did to all our lives, and on 13 November 1942,
I entered the military service at Grey's Armory, Philadelphia, Pa.,
after entry classification in New Cumberland, Pa.  I was assigned to
the Army Air Forces.
  After basic training at Atlantic City, NJ, and having chosen as my
alternate assignment, aircraft armorer, my primary choice of
meteorology being filled, I left the east coast in January of 1943,
for the Aircraft Armore's Technical School, at Lowry Field II,
outside of Denver, Colo.  This was outstanding in my life, since, for
the first time in my life, I was on my own, and had a feeling of life.
Denver has always had a deep meaning to me in my memories for this
reason.
  At this school, we had to make a decision - either to continue as
ground force personnel, or to choose aircraft gunnery, as part of a
bomber team, which was the next step.
  The choice, I guess, was the 'glamorous' one of aerial gunnery, but
we were also given long lectures as to our country needing us in the
New Air Force, just then beginning to expand.
  The challenge of this appeal was such that I accepted and was sent
to Laredo, Texas, for basic gunnery training.  This was in March of
1943.  Here I remained until January of 1945.
  Meanwhile, I had been corresponding via Uncle Sam's mails with a
very dear person from back in Ardmore, Pennsylvania.  In October,
1943, I convinced her to become engaged, due to a short unfreezing of
furloughs.  I went home to Ardmore in January of 1944, so that we
could publicly announce our intentions.
  We had hoped that I would be able to come home that summer of 1944,
to be married before our families, but since that years was a
momentous one in the U.S. war years, with D-Day intervening, all
furloughs were frozen, indefinitely.
  We decided, then and there, that we would rather live together, if
only for a short while, than apart for an indefinite period, so my
beloved wife-to-be, Grace Lauretta Pettitt, joined me in Laredo,
Texas.
  There were were married, November 4, 1944, at 4:30 PM in Christ
Church, Episcopal, the Rev. Ben Smith officiating.
  With the phasing out of the aerial gunnery program at Laredo in
January of 1945, I was transferred to an overseas training station in
Walla Walla, Washington, where, with my wife, we lived until my
discharge from the service in January of 1946.
  In February of 1946 [came] my final separation from the Service as
Sergeant, at Sacramento, Callifornia - McClelland AFB.
  After a short trip to San Francisco, we returned home to Ardmore,
Pa., and I resumed my civilian life, returning to my job with the
E. I. DuPont de Nemours & Co. in Wilmington, Del., as Senior Export
Correspondent.
  In September 1946, I was offered the opportunity to go to Mexico and
Central America as technical representative for the Fabric & Finishes
Division, which I accepted.
  Although I had to leave in October 1946 for my new post, I left
Grace in Ardmore, since we were expecting the birth of our first child.
On December 28, 1946 at 8:30 AM, our daughter, [living person] was
born in the Bryn Mawr Hospital, Bryn Mawr, Pa.
  We lived in Mexico City until 1949, when my company changed my
headquarters to Guatemala City, Guatemala, until August 1951.  In
Guatemala, we were joined by our son, Robert James IV, born in the
American Hospital, Guatemala City, 2 August, 1949.
  In August of 1951, I decided that it was time to return to the
United States, to raise my family under more settled conditions, so
I resigned from the DuPont Co., and returned to Ardmore.
  In October, 1951, I accepted a bid to join the Sherwin Williams Co.,
in their Export Division.  [I joined] the company as Manager of
Associated Products (selling everything and anything that the company
did not make, or was associated with thte use or application of
paint).  I moved my family to northern New Jersey, first to Metuchen,
then to Edison Township, where we proudly owned our first home.  In
1957, due to my "affliction" with asthma, we had to move to a higher
elevation, so we bought a home in Berkeley Heights, not too far from
our first home, in the Watching hills.  This was our home until
September 1967, when again I was transferred - to the Rubberset Co.,
a division in Crisfield, Maryland, on the eastern shore of the
Delmarva peninsula.  We found a home in Salisbury, Maryland, (on the
eastern shore of the Chesapeake) which we enjoyed for seven years,
after the hectic turmoil of the metropolitan area of northern New
Jersey.  We again moved into a new house which we saw being built.
We moved from here to our new location in Cleveland as a result of
a company transfer.  Cleveland, Ohio was and is our company's
headquarters (Sherwin Williams - the foremost paint manufacturer in
the U.S.).  Here, we again moved into a new home in North Ridgeville,
Lorain County, the county adjacent to Cayuhoga, which includes
Cleveland.  I lived here until the untimely death of my beloved Grace,
in 2 November 1980.
  On April 10, 1970, our beloved daughter, [living person], after
graduating from [a university] with a MS in Interior Design, married
[living person].  [Further information on these living ones is here
delineated, but witheld by me.- VES.]
  Our son, Robert James Hardie IV, was single and lived with his
parents.  Robert died 9 March 1991, of complications resulting from
his long [incidence of] schizophrenia.  He was a brilliant, loving
son, and will be missed.  He is buried with his mother in the Pettitt
plot in St Paul's Lutheran Cemetery, in Ardmore, Montgomery Co., Pa.
Attached to his gravestone is a bronze plaque denoting his "perpetual
membership" in the National Sons of the American Revolution, which
memorial was accorded to him, and in his memory by the Society, in
Cleveland, of which I am also a Life Member.  Finally, in the worst
blow to me was the death of my beloved Grace to cancer.  She died at
12:00 PM in the Elyria Memorial Hospital, Elyria, Lorain, Ohio.  Her
burial is mentioned above.
  In October 1981, I sold my home in North Ridgeville, and moved a
short way eastward to Westlake, Cuyahoga, Ohio.  I lived at the
Timber Ridge Apartments from 1 November until 3 March 1995, when at
my daughter's suggestion I moved again to my present location at
[withheld] Nebraska, a short 15 min. ride to my [daughter's] home.
  I was, and still remain, a member of the local Protestant Episcopal
church [name withheld], having been baptized on the USS Pennsylvania
by the Fleet Chaplain of the U.S. Navby (at that time in Callao -
Peru's harbor - on 5 February, 1921.  My certificate and a picture of
my 'church' hangs here in [my] den, with a story published in a local
paper about the rites.  This brings me up to the present (1996).
[Note: A fair amount of data about living persons appears next, which
is, of course, withheld.  Robert James Hardie, the author of this
article, eventually was received into a Nebraska home for the elderly,
due to afflictions that were beyond the means of his family to attend
to.  He suffered arthritis, diabetes, Parkinson's Disease, acute
anemia, and minor contentions with skin cancer, in addition to what he
lists above.  He died December 3, 1999.  I had been in communication
with him via the postal service for about two years.  I had contact
with him primarily in connection with the surname Kite.  He had asked
me to put his genealogical connections online.  His family had given
him permission to include them, but out of concern for their welfare,
I have withheld that information.- VES]