Illinois became the setting for the longest chapter of Ralph's working life. From the late 1950s until his retirement in 1990, his days were shaped by a long career in the steel industry, the responsibilities of supporting a growing family, and the home and life he and Betty established in Calumet City.

For nearly thirty-four years, Ralph worked at Acme Steel, later Interlake Steel. The work provided stability for his family but also became a major part of the rhythm of his everyday life. During those same decades, the young Army veteran who had once left Tennessee in search of work became a longtime steelworker, homeowner, father of six, and eventually a grandfather.

Away from the mill, Ralph's life centered on home and family. The Merrill Avenue house became the place where he and Betty raised their children and where Ralph put his practical skills to work over the years. Family photographs and memories preserve not only the milestones of these decades, but also the ordinary moments that reveal what life was like between them.

By the time Ralph retired in 1990, Illinois had been his home for more than three decades. The years between his arrival and retirement had transformed the young man from Tennessee into the husband, father, grandfather, steelworker, and homeowner his family remembers.

After Ralph and Betty moved from Sheboygan to the Chicago area, Ralph began working at Acme Steel, beginning what would become a career of nearly thirty-four years. He would later work under the Interlake Steel name, but the mill remained a constant part of Ralph’s working life until his retirement in 1990. 

When Ralph first started at Acme, Marty remembered that his father worked as a slitter's assistant, helping with the process of cutting wide coils of steel into narrower widths. It was demanding industrial work around heavy steel and machinery, but it provided Ralph with the steady income he needed to support Betty and their growing family.

The job also reunited Ralph with his identical twin brother, Ray, who worked at Acme as well. Marty remembered that the brothers worked in the same building and that their resemblance sometimes caused confusion among their coworkers. After military service had taken the twins in different directions, Ralph and Ray were once again working near one another.

One surviving record from those years is Ralph's 1966 Interlake Steel employee badge. Like many historical records, it contains an interesting error: the badge lists Ralph's eyes as brown, although his eyes were blue. 

Life Around the Shifts

Steel-mill work became part of the rhythm of Stovall family life. Ralph worked rotating shifts, which the family remembers calling “split shifts,” as well as overtime when it was available. Ann remembers periods when he worked two weeks from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., followed by two weeks from 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. According to Marty, Ralph preferred the 3-to-11 shift.

Even that schedule became part of his children’s memories. Ann remembers that she and Troy liked the weeks when their father worked 3-to-11 because Betty would make the children the foods they liked for dinner. It is one of those small memories that shows how Ralph’s work at the mill became woven into everyday family life.

For a time, the family had only one car. As the older boys earned their driver's licenses, they sometimes drove Ralph to work so they could use the car, then returned to pick him up after his shift. 

Providing for His Family

Marty remembered that Ralph took overtime when he could, particularly around Thanksgiving and Christmas, when the extra hours meant additional money for the holidays and presents for the children. For Ralph, the long hours were part of providing for a household that eventually included Betty and six children.

Marty later experienced Acme Steel for himself, working there while in high school and again during college breaks to earn money for school. He remembered that the pay was good, but the work was hard. Having worked in the same mill gave Marty a greater appreciation for what his father had done year after year.

Marty also remembered that Ralph never complained about having to go to work. To his children, his willingness to work steadily, take difficult shifts, and put in extra hours became one of the ways they understood their father’s commitment to his family.

Ralph’s work changed over the course of his long career. Although the family has not yet documented all of the positions he held through the years, Tom remembered that Ralph’s final position at Acme/Interlake was as an inspector. His career had begun as a slitter’s assistant and ended nearly thirty-four years later in inspection work.

Over a twelve-year period, Ralph and Betty's family grew from their first son, Martin Leslie, born in 1955, to six children with the birth of Ann in 1967. Raising a large family while Ralph worked long and changing hours at the steel mill shaped much of their life in Illinois.

Marty remembered that his father worked to provide his children with a safe, calm, and peaceful home. Ralph's long hours at Acme and the demands of supporting a growing family meant that his time with the children could sometimes be limited, but providing for them remained central to his life.

Ralph and Betty shared responsibility for discipline and, by the standards of their time, could both be strict. The children knew there were rules and consequences when those rules were pushed too far. Ann remembers that she and Troy sometimes tested the limits, particularly the rule that they were supposed to be home by dark.

Behind those rules was Ralph's concern for their safety. When the children were younger and playing outside, he might walk toward the middle of the block after dark looking for them when they had stayed out too long. Years later, when Ann was old enough to be out at night, she remembers her father checking to make sure she had returned home safely.

Family vacations often centered on something that had always been important to Ralph and Betty—family itself. Trips frequently meant returning to Sheboygan, Wisconsin, to visit Betty's relatives or traveling south to Huntland, Tennessee, to spend time with Ralph's family. In that way, the children growing up in Illinois maintained connections with both sides of the family and with the places where their parents had grown up.

One trip created a particularly lasting memory for Ann. While visiting Betty's sister Martha in Florida, the children persuaded their parents to take them to Walt Disney World. On the final day, Betty was tired and decided not to return to the park. Ann spent the day exploring EPCOT with her father, just the two of them. Decades later, it remained one of her fondest memories of time alone with Ralph.

Some of the lessons Ralph passed along were quieter. Ann remembers him teaching her the difference between “wants” and “needs,” particularly when it came to money. The children had chores, and although Ann does not remember receiving an allowance, learning to distinguish what was wanted from what was truly needed stayed with her.

Other connections became apparent only with time. Ralph enjoyed gardening and bowling and was careful about money. Ann later developed those same interests and habits—small similarities between father and daughter that became more noticeable as the years passed. 

Looking back, Ralph's role as a father was expressed less through grand gestures than through the accumulated routines of everyday life: working to support six children, maintaining their home, setting boundaries, worrying when they were late, taking them to see distant relatives, and trying to provide the safe and stable environment he wanted for his family.

Marty remembered Ralph as a man of integrity who could be trusted, someone who remained faithful to his wife and children and could be counted on when his family needed help. As the children grew older, those qualities remained part of their relationship with their father.

The children's names also preserved small pieces of family history and memories of Ralph and Betty themselves. Martin Leslie carried the Martin family name and the middle name of Ralph's father, Charles Leslie Stovall. James Allen shared Ralph's first name, James, although the family is no longer certain whether the name may also have honored Ralph's grandfather, James Cundiff Martin; the origin of Allen is not known.

When Lillian Kay was born in 1960, Ralph wanted to name her for his mother, Hester Lillian Stovall. He initially favored Hester, but Betty preferred her mother-in-law's middle name, and their daughter became Lillian. Thomas Gary's name came with its own family story, remembered years later by his siblings. 

The younger children's names brought other influences. The family remembers that Ralph liked television personality Troy Donahue and actor John Wayne, inspirations associated with the name Troy Wayne. Wayne may also have honored Ralph's Uncle Bill, whose middle name was Wayne. Ann was told that Ralph chose Ann Marie after Italian actress and singer Anna Maria Alberghetti, whom he admired. Whether Ralph knew it or not, Ann was also a name already found much farther back in the Stovall family line: Bartholomew Stovall's first wife was named Ann.

The six children Ralph and Betty had raised would eventually leave childhood behind and begin lives of their own. But the family Ralph had worked so hard to provide for was not becoming smaller. It was about to expand into another generation.

In 1981, Ralph became a grandfather for the first time, beginning another chapter in the family he and Betty had built together. As more grandchildren arrived, birthdays, holidays, births, and ordinary family gatherings took on a new dimension. Ralph and Betty watched as their children became parents and another generation became part of the family.

Christmas Eve became one of the family's annual traditions. As Ralph and Betty's children established homes of their own, the celebration moved among the homes of Tom, Marty, and Jim, and eventually Troy. Ralph and Betty remained part of those gatherings year after year as children and grandchildren came together.

The gatherings often extended beyond Ralph and Betty's immediate family. Ralph's twin brother, Ray, and members of Ray's family joined family occasions as well. The connection between the twins that had begun during their childhood in Tennessee continued into another generation as their families remained connected.

Ralph and Betty played an especially important role in the lives of Lillian's daughters, Melony and Julie, helping to care for and raise them. The Merrill Avenue house that had once been filled with Ralph and Betty's own six children became part of their granddaughters' childhood as well.

Over the years, Ralph and Betty's grandchildren became a familiar part of their everyday lives. One photograph taken in Jimmy's backyard captures the growing family particularly well. Members of both Ralph's and Ray's families had gathered together, bringing several generations of the Stovall family into one photograph.

By Ralph's later years, a family gathering might include children, grandchildren, his twin brother, nieces, nephews, and other relatives. The young man who had once left Tennessee in search of work was now surrounded by generations of family.