My short career in forgery.

tale of childhood.

One Saturday, as was our custom, my mother took my younger sister and I to the A&P grocery store on Smithfield Avenue. We normally would walk to the store pushing the grocery cart that the A&P management graciously allowed us to take home every week do our weekly grocery shopping. On this week, for some unknown reason, my Aunt Gert and her husband picked us up in their automobile and My mother went in on her own to cash my fathers paycheck check and to pay a utility bill, while we two youngsters along with our Aunt and Uncle, sat and waited in the vehicle. I guess grocery shopping would wait for another day. Within ten minutes or so, my mother returned. My mother was holding a Kleenex to her face and she was crying. Something was wrong, but I didn't know what. Suddenly and being very upsetting it occurred to me that adults cry too. It must have been something really bad that happened, for my mother to cry as I always thought of her as nearly invincible. My sister and I kept quiet and listened to all three adults talk about what had just happened. Apparently there was a new store manager and he wouldn't allow my mother to cash my fathers paycheck. She had then pleaded with the man, telling him that all his co-workers there knew her and they all knew that my father traveled for his job and that he knew that his paycheck was being cashed every week by my mother. Household utility bills had to be paid. Groceries for a young family had to be purchased. It would be weeks before my father would be returning. In the past my father had thought this may happen and he had attempted to have his company automatically deposit his paycheck in a bank account, so my mother could access the funds but it was against the company policy. He attempted to have them make the paycheck out to my mothers name. Again - against company policy.

As we sat in the car, my Aunt Gert who was a person with a wonderful soul and a heart of gold, attempted to console my mother and encourage her with ideas, offered to have her husband go into the store and speak with the manager and then offered to drive us to another store where she could again try cashing the paycheck. My mother replied no and she just wanted to give up for now and go home. So we did go home and the thoughts of adult problems don't stay long with children and soon we were home, playing with neighborhood friends and doing other things, with other priorities and we were not even thinking about where our next meals would come from. During dinner that evening, my mother was oddly quiet and didn't mention anything about the days events and after dinner and after the table was cleared away, and the dishes washed, my mother called me to her and said to me, "You write just like your father", and she produced an old document with my father's signature on it and told me to be careful and write on the back of this check, exactly how my father wrote his name. I did and the signature was a perfect match. My father and I were both left handed, I figure that is why our signatures were so much alike. My mother then co-signed the check with her signature, beneath my father's forged one.

The following morning off to the A&P store we go. My younger sister, my mother and I, pushing our borrowed grocery cart. The manager quickly and quietly processed the check and handed my mother the cash. He seemed like he may have been embarrassed for his overly strict behavior on the day before, and didn't make any eye contact with my mother.

In any event, for the next few years, signing my fathers paycheck became one of my weekly chores.

Rev. Edward McClelland 09-19-2025