| Notes |
- North Tonawanada NY Evening News - 2/14/1967
A lonely heart, having been
broken and mended many times,
iither shrinks with bitterness or
grows with understanding. When
"it grows large and loving, we
trail it a Valentine.
Mrs. Margaret Langbehn, a
former Tonawandan who lives in
Sanborn is a Valentine. Her
friends call her Peggy but today
-we are going to call her "Peg
O' My Heart."
The little 78-pound woman
spends all of her spare time
inaking baskets and jewel boxes
°from Christmas cards. Patients
5n DeGraff Memorial Hospital
and area nursing homes who
have had one of her little baskets
delivered to their room, are
seldom aware that the donor
fashioned them so painstakingly
with her arthritic hands.
"It's all I know how to do and
all I can afford," she says. "It's
so wonderful to be able to give
something to make others hap-
py. When I do, then I am happy
too.
° **I started making the baskets
43 years ago after a serious operation,
and I needed something
to do during a long convalescence,"
she said. "My husband,
-Hubert, helped me get started.
cutting a pattern and helping me
fit the pieces together. When my
health was better, I carried the
first 100 baskets to DeGraff Memorial
Hospital, walking from
E lm Wood Park, Tonawanda,
where we lived at the time. It
was a bitter, wintry day so I left
them at the desk and hospital
personnel distributed them. It's
a trip I have made many times
since.
"Later I included other hospitals
and nursing homes on my
list. I also have mailed hundreds
to individuals when I read
or heard about anyone incurably
HI In most cases, I receive no
thank-you at all but the lack of it
has never bothered me."
Nobody knows better than Peggy
what it means to be truly
alone in the world. Now 58 years
old, she doesn't know for sure
who she is. She can't recall anything
beyond her fifth birthday
when a Niagara Falls family
took her from an orphan's home
in Pennsylvania. All they knew
about her was her birth date.
The family called her Margaret
and kept her until shg was 13
years old. She then went to work
in a Buffalo Meat Packing Co.
rather than return to a home.
She went to school on Thursdays
in order to make her working
"legal" and studied typing so
that she could better herself.
She went to . South Carolina
when she was about 20, then to
Georgia and later to Florida,
working first as a waitress, then
for the government. In Florida,
she was married.
"I thought: Finally, there is
someone to care for me," she
said. But her husband went
blind and she worked to support
them. He later died and Peggy
was tossed out into the world
again.
During these years, she saved
her money and three times traveled
to the Pennsylvania capitol
to learn her identity. On the
third trip, personnel in the records
department said there were
13 girls bom Feb. 9, 1909 and 12
had been accounted for. 'Then
you must be ,"
they said. But she will never
really know.
After her husband's death, Peggy
returned to Buffalo. Here she
met and married Hubert Langbehn.
That was 20 years ago.
The couples married life has
been happy but it has been beset
by illness and hardship. They
never complain.
Last year, Mr. Langbehn had
a serious operation. Their finances
fell to a low ebb and they
moved to Sanborn. There they
rented a 150-year-old farm house
on Bridgeman Road. Farm animals
had been housed in the
cottage. Together the couple set
about cleaning it up and slowly
but surely, they are making it
livable. With a few bags of cement
they have begun to shore
up the foundation and pave the
walks. Peggy planted tomatoes
and vegetables to eat, and roses
around a dry well to make their
life more beautiful
They get their water from a
neighbor's well. Peggy has a
washing machine but no room in
the cottage for it, so she heats
the icy water, washes their clothing
in the bathtub and wrings
them with her aching hands.
Her husband whom she has
nicknamed "Bounce" works
nights in Buffab to avoid traffic.
If her hands don't pain too badly,
Peggy then gets her sewing
out and works'on her little baskets.
Each side of each basket,
though it may feature a cold
snow scene, will be shaped at the
top like a big heart.
If those who receive the baskets
look carefully, they can read
Peg's simple message: "I love
you. Be my Valentine."
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1909 - Yes, date unknown