A city boy gone farm

What those early days on the farm with Franklin (a city boy gone farm boy) were like…

First of all, Franklin had been a farm boy at heart, since he was old enough to go to the farms of some of his friends and "help" with chores but most of all ride horses and play in the hay!

He told of one episode that got him in trouble. He and some of the boys made a tunnel thru some hay in the haymow so they could smoke, being VERY careful to put the matches and cigarettes out in a little can of water brought for safety's sake. I think he said that they got the idea from some other older buddies. They had a flashlight for extra precaution. Somehow they got caught and punished, but he never told this story much as it was so stupid and dangerous.

He loved to ride the horses or ponies and always dreamed that some day he would get a pony and have a place for one, so he saved up enough money and sent off for a pony saddle. He never got to own a pony but hung on to that saddle for a long time. Someone else may remember hearing whatever happened to it. His mom may have taken care of the situation.

The farmers that he worked for during the summers were prosperous hard-working good people, so he did love farm life as he saw it in those days. After he was old enough to get summer jobs, he worked for a dairy farmer delivering milk. Then, when in high school, he was a paper boy. He liked everything about that job except having to get up so early. His mom "suffered much agony gettin' him up most mornings", she said.

I suppose all the above has a little bearing on what it was like in those early days on the farm. Maybe.

After the "honeymoon" days, reality set in pretty quickly, but it didn't seem to bother us so much until the advantage of city life was SO missing. Still, I was able and willing to take it in stride and so was Franklin.

Other than the other things I've mentioned (dust storms etc. that went along with the Great Depression) the first four or five years of marriage put us to the test!

First, though, I will mention the good neighbors, our families, and friends and the smalltown folk; how they all helped us and cared about us in so many ways.

About two weeks after we were married, the neighbors all around surprised us with a shivaree and shower. We were sitting in the kitchen when all of a sudden we heard horns honking, cow bells ringing, pounding on buckets with sticks, I suppose, then hollering of "Come on out!!!" They brought all kinds of home canned food and homemade ice-cream and cake. What a welcome it was. Of course Franklin had met and knew many of them. Delbert Everly, our closest neighbor, "tricked" Franklin into letting him borrow his car to go to Rosendale. Wanted to make sure that we'd be home! It ws Delbert who gave us a bred gilt. She had the cutest litter of piglets, which gave us a jump start in the hog "business". My folks gave us 100 baby chicks. One of the hens from that bunch was speckled and different from the rest. We kept her until she died of old age "just because". They also gave us some meat when they butchered and garden veggies when they had "some to spare". I sometimes helped can peaches etc. and could have some too.

Franklin's folks bought us most of our furniture and gave us much in the way of food--you name it. We both had wonderful parents, something to be thankful for indeed.

Other things that happened were the ice storms and the snow blizzard. During the ice storm, everything was covered with thick ice, so much so that one could ice skate on the road. We lost some cows that winter. Franklin didn't think what would happen if he turned all of the cows out of the barn to go to the water tank which was downhill from the barn and close to the creek. Instead of letting them out one at a time, they all tried to run to get to the tank first, knocking into one another, falling and sliding downhill, some landing in the creek. I don't remember how many died of broken legs etc. Some were pulled out by ropes and tractor.

The above happened I think quite a lot later. The first winter we also had ice that covered everything, and we didn't have a wood pile stored up in preparation so Franklin had to take the hand saw and saw some lower limbs off of trees in the yard. In the process a limb came down and hit him on the top of his head. He came in the house bleeding. It did leave a scar, in more ways than one. It was so cold that moisture froze on the kitchen wall, and the water had frozen in the water bucket by morning. By this time we were living in one room, the dining room. That is where the heating stove was. We moved the little kerosene cook stove and the cot to sleep and all in that one room. At that time we didn't have our dining room furniture. Then came a snow blizzard, but not before we managed to get the cross-saw out and saw up some wood in the back porch and kitchen--we could do some water heating on the heating stove. The teakettle was a comfort and furnished moisture and hot water at all times. Of course we had to carry water from the hand pump well which was several feet from the back door.

This is a part of our early days; more disasters happened in the years to come, but for the most part changed for the better. We stared out without a telephone, no gravel roads--just dust or mud...deep mud, no washing machine, no electricity, no tractor, just a team and a walking plow, a hoe and a rake and binder twine for marking the rows in the garden, bug dust, and a fly swatter.

One incident that almost "got my goat" was the time I had washed (on the board) and hung the clothes on the line. It was windy so made it a little harder to hang, besides it had rained and was partly muddy underfoot. Only nice thing it was sunny and the clothes would dry quicker and smell sweeter; nothing nicer than to sleep under sheets that dried on the line. After a time I looked out to find that the clothes line had broken and all of the clothes were on the ground. I can still remember what a time I had washing all of those clothes over, besides having to carry the water--extra water. Oh well that was forgotten and I believe Franklin took me for a spin in the little Ford Roadster to see my folks or maybe his folks, no matter, no use crying over "spilled milk".

I have so many fond memories and lots to be thankful for past and present. And whatever our future holds depends a lot on how we live our todays.

Print this post