Mary M. Mantel (January 31, 1894 – November 5, 1979) was a wiry character. In her eighties, she looked every bit like a woman you see in old-time, formally posed, black and white photographs, where everyone looks stern, taken when a puff of smoke accompanied flash photography. Though she was old, she wasn’t stodgy; you couldn’t pull anything over on her. A con artist once tried to bilk her of her life savings with an investment scheme, but no one could manipulate or boss her around, no matter how slick they were. She lived out her days renting rooms in her house to students attending Ely Junior College. She was my grandmother, and everyone knew she made the best potica in town.

Mary was the second wife of Joseph Mantel (my grandfather, May 11, 1872 – July 19, 1958) and twenty-two-and-a-half years his junior. His first wife, Fannie, died childless, and we know little of her. Joseph, early on, worked for the iron ore mines recruiting workers from the old country of Yugoslavia (the region now called Slovenia). Family lore has it that Fannie (his first wife) used to babysit Mary (his second wife, my grandmother) when the latter was a child, back in the old country. After she grew up to marriageable age, Joseph brought Mary to the new country of Ely, Minnesota (not Bethlehem!), where they raised my mother, Margaret (October 22, 1919 – July 4, 1996), and five other children.

Mom was born when Grandpa was forty-seven years old and Grandma twenty-five. The children did not call Joseph “father” but addressed him as “Mr. Mantel.” Probably the marriage was one of convenience more than anything else. Indeed, we don’t get the impression of him being a loving, fatherly type or the household being a place of fun and warmth.

Mom never talked about her home life or upbringing, but we know they were a Catholic family who regularly attended Sunday church services, making the short walk from home. Mom was adamant about being Catholic, fiercely so. As for her mother, Grandma Mantel, I have no memory of her spiritual or church life. She and Joseph were just the “old” grandparents. My favorite grandparents were on my dad’s side (who were far more fun than on my mom’s side.) Don’t get me wrong, they were good people; I just didn’t know much about them because they were so old.

My only memory of Grandpa Mantel is of him in a makeshift bedroom on the main floor of the big house on Main Street. A divider shielded him from the usual traffic in and out of the front door. He was confined to bed with “hardening of the arteries”—probably some form of dementia, but that word had a much more negative connotation in those days. He was just a still body, always sleeping; we might take a quick peek out of curiosity, but no talking. He died when I was about eight years old, and I remember Mom gathering us children to kneel around the bed and recite the “Our Father” and some “Hail Marys.” That was my first awareness of a thing called death.

Well, Grandma, the spry old gal, lived to the ripe age of eighty-five and died when I was twenty-seven. So I am more familiar with her than Grandpa Mantel. Although our visit to Ely for our two weeks of summer vacation was all about the farm and the Gianotti grandparents, the visit wasn’t complete without stopping at the Mantel house. I can still picture her in that billowy “old-lady” dress, sprinkled with faded images of flowers, hanging down around and between her legs as she sat on a straight-back kitchen chair with red cushions affixed to the seat and back. Her arm always found its resting place on the chrome-legged, white-top table, and her apron forever hung on her old, frail body. Despite the tiredness of old age, she had a certain old-world strength. Her thick Slavic accent still resonated after living seventy-five years in the “New World.”

Grandma had a reputation for being a great potica baker. I remember seeing her kitchen table covered with dough spread thin, hanging over the sides, ready to be covered with the wonderful walnut, honey, butter, and cinnamon recipe, rolled up and snaked into the baking pans. My other grandparents raved about “Mrs. Mantel’s” (as they called her) potica being the best in town. Every summer, we all would make a grand visit to the Mantel house for this freshly baked treat.

Grandma walked with a small stoop and a slight limp. Her small wire-rimmed glasses hung on her gaunt face, with frequent squinting to keep them up on her nose. She smiled easily, but you could sense that if you crossed her, she would let you have it in no uncertain terms. If my other grandfather (my father’s side) was there when she (whom he called “Mrs. Mantel,” never Mary) started to get worked up over something, he had the uncanny ability to calm her down with some good-natured teasing. She would respond by threatening to clobber him with her rolling pin. Picture a petite old woman and a rugged, manly outdoorsman having a good laugh together. No one else could do that with her but Jack Gianotti, Sr.

Her house was an adventure, filled with old furniture and musty rooms. Only occasionally did we stay overnight there. The back garage, adjacent to the alley, was filled with even more old, unused furniture. Later as an adult in my fifties, my wife and I visited Ely and discovered the old Mantel house still standing, right there as I remember it. I was taken back to days when we would sit out front on the Fourth of July watching the Independence Day parade going by and later going to watch fireworks.

The house had been turned into a restaurant called “Mom’s Place.” So I felt it only appropriate to go in and have a meal. We asked for the owners and told them our story, and they invited us to look around. What a blast from the past! It looked just the same as my childhood memories! Only then did I realize that though I didn’t know my Mantel grandparents very well, I felt a renewed reconnection with my heritage, a greater appreciation for how my story is rooted in Slovenia, a second wife of a man twenty-two years older, an immigrant family from the old world—all part of one chain link of humanity that resulted in me coming into this world. I thank God for my grandparents Joseph and Mary Mantel, and my mother, Margaret, my flesh-and-blood forebears!