James Ernest Sipprell

 Jim was appreciated as a warm loving father to Arthur Edwin Sipprell and James Ernest Sipprell Jr.  born in 1915 (fraternal twins) and Jean Letitia Sipprell born in 1920.

The kids remember their father especially for participating with them in “Amateur Gymnastic Shows” on Saturdays at different Rotary Functions. 

In 1928 the Sipprell family moved to Seattle near Ravenna , then to Forest Park.  Jean remembers that her father left the K&S partnership when he found out that the Kinney was bringing illegal alcohol across the Canadian border using their piano trucks. 

When the “Great Depression” hit in 1929 Jim worked for NRA.  (One of President Roosevelt’s Working Corps)  

In the 1950’s  Sipprell and Quistorff grandkids remember sharing holidays with their grandparents in North Seattle .  Jim had a Sipprell and Sons Piano Business in the University District for many years.  I remember Grand-dads old green Dodge.  He was a pretty fast driver and Grandma was frequently reminding him to slow down, especially on a car trip to Soap Lake .  All the grand-kids remember trips to the ocean.  

One dream of Grandpa Sipprell’s was to have a farm.  He fulfilled his dream during the last years of his life.  Palma and Jim moved up to Arlington Heights .  They had a cow (Queenie), calf (Nickolina), chickens,  a garden, and lots of grandkids coming to visit. 

Grand-dad can be remembered as a warm, friendly, handsome man with a wonderful sense of humor. 

  Jim’s two sisters:  Ruby taught school and married in her 40’s to Vancouver business man  George Moore?– No children.  Ada married and had one son Peter.

   My Memories of our Grandparents James Ernest Sipprell

By Carla Quistorff Pfaff

 Grandad went Alaska for a summer when he was about 16. I think it was to be a cook for a gold dredging crew. Not sure if it was with his dad or not. He also may have worked on the dredge besides being cook. That may have been where he acquired a liking for Robert Service poems about Alaska. He could recite whole poems of his. I particularly remember him saying “The Cremation of Sam McGee”. Grandad also liked sports and physical activities. He was a wrestler in college and he liked gymnastics. Mom has a few pictures of when they were at the beach when she was about 4 or 5 – granddad holding her up with one hand – she was standing on his hand held above his head. She also has a picture with one of the boys standing on granddad’s shoulders and she was standing on her brother’s shoulders – a three story trick. They also liked to go to the beach in the summer. They traveled to Europe early in their marriage. They went by ship. They also bought a picture (lithograph?) there I believe in the Netherlands. It is reminiscent of Venice with a canal and steps up to houses. They bought the picture because they actually walked up those steps while they were there. Mom still has that picture. I remember at his funeral the pastor talked about his having been a lawyer. He won his first and only case – a murder case. Apparently the man could not have done it because of the tides (It happened on the beach). The tide was in when the man was killed and it would had to have been out. But he said it did not pay well enough for a man who just had twin boys born to his family. Then he went on to something else. Mom was born 5 years later. Granddad was a coupon administrator during World War II. Everyone got so many coupons per week for the size of the family they had – flour, sugar, gas meat, etc. He never took any extra coupons for his family which he could easily have done. His honesty and integrity were well known. I remember when he was at our house for dinner, occasionally he would keep us children occupied by drawing. It was a guessing game. He would use a pencil and start drawing something he could see in the living room. He would start with a part of the item that we could not recognize right away (some obscure part of a table, lamp, couch, etc.) then we would have to guess as he was drawing. The first person to guess would have the letter of their name next to the completed drawing. He was good at drawing. He used perspective in his drawings. I remember he would occasionally play the piano ^» we had at our house. He sounded wonderful to me but mom said that he always played the same thing – that it was not a written piece just something he made up. I remember the farm near Arlington – the root cellar dug into the ground where they kept potatoes and their canning from the summer, the kittens, the cold,wonderful tasting water, the sheets that smelled so fresh from being hung outside on the line to dry.

Granddad died of brain cancer  in 1958.