Stay or Move?

The year was 1950. I was seven years old. Hard times fell on the farm. After five years of tough times dad was between a rock and a hard place. With the cost of supplies rising that were needed to continue the farming operation dad tried to purchase the farm from the landlord. The landlord quoted dad a price he could not afford and thus began the shift in thinking about what dad was going to do. He opted to move to town, Oak Grove, and he didn't know what he was going to do. Grandmother Walraven, dads mother, gave him a small lot to build a house on for the family. Dad had never built a house but he thought he would give it a try.

The house was small. Back then they called it a "cracker box." I don't remember the dimensions but it was really small. The bathroom was so small you could wash your face in the sink while sitting on the pot! There was just enough room in the bedrooms (2) to walk around the bed. The kitchen was unbelievably small. The front room, as we called it, was the largest room in the house. I would guess it was about 10 feet by 12 feet. But the house was our home and we loved it.

While dad was building the house someone stopped by and asked him if he would build them a house. And since he had no prospects of doing anything else, he said that he would. That job led him to another building job and then another and then another. Soon after Grayum Building Company was born and the stage was set for dad to be a small-time builder in and around Oak Grove.

One interesting note about when we were packing up to leave the farm and move to town. My dad told my brother to not forget the plane that was in the barn. Well, I went nuts when I heard that we had a plane in the barn. I had never seen an airplane in the barn and I had played all over every square inch of that barn. I immediately ran to the barn ahead of my brother to see if I could find the plane. When I told my brother I had never seen an airplane in the barn and I didn't even know we had an airplane, he began to laugh hilariously. He took me to the workbench and showed me a tool used to plane smooth edges on a board. A plane. Not an airplane like I had thought.

I was almost eight years old when we moved to town.

A new saga began and the story continues.

Go Fish !

My first time fishing was in Sni creek, bordering the western part of the farm. My mothers nephew, Ed Lawson, took me. He was about 16 or 17 years old. He was visiting us during the summer and decided he wanted to go fishing. He rigged up a cane pole and we headed out for the quarter mile hike to the creek. We caught some grasshoppers along the way to use for bait.

It seemed like a long time passed but he finally caught a fish, a ten inch long catfish. I had caught nothing ... nada ... zilch-o! I was really excited that he'd caught a fish and I wanted to clean it, take it back to the house and eat it.

He didn't want to do that and instead proposed that we cut the fish up and use it for bait ! I was very opposed to the idea but my opposition was over-ruled. I said we could walk back through the hay field and catch some more grasshoppers but he said the "cut bait" would work better and that we would catch a whole bunch more fish.

Well ... the "cut bait" didn't work and we didn't catch any more fish the rest of the afternoon. I was crushed. My first fishing trip and I was going home empty handed!

But that's the way it goes. Sometimes you just "go fish" and at other times you "catch." I would rather go "catching" than just "fishing" any day.

Camel Cigarettes

I remember harvest times on the farm were good times. Harvesting was hard work and I mostly watched because I was too little to be of much help. There are two primary times for "putting up" hay. One in late spring and one in late summer. Once the hay is cut, it has to lay for a few hours, and then be baled before the evening dew sets in. So, depending on how large the field is, it can run into late night before you are done hauling in the hay and getting it in the barn.

I remember on one occasion dad had several men come over to the farm and help him put up the hay. They came to our house around noon and immediately went to work doing whatever it was that they did. I remember being down in the hay field with them and dad called to me to come over to where he was. He told me to go to the house and get him a pack of cigarettes. He smoked Camels and I thought the camel on the front of the pack was pretty cool. I went to the house and told mom that dad needed a pack of cigarettes, so she gave me a pack to take to him. I took them to him and gave them to him.

Then I got a bright idea !

I thought that I'd like a cigarette for me to smoke. I couldn't go to dad and ask for one because, of course, he wouldn't give me one. So I went back to the house in a little while and told mom that dad needed another pack of cigarettes. She questioned me rather thoroughly but finally gave me another pack. So now I was set.

Well, I didn't have anything to light the cigarettes with so I just pretended to smoke them. It was pretty cool smoking (or at least pretending to smoke) like all the other big men on the hay crew.

After the hay was cut and left to dry for awhile in the field, all the men went to the house for a meal before they began to bale and haul in the hay. Before we sat down at the table mom asked dad why he needed another pack of cigarettes since she had already sent one to him via me. He asked her what did she mean? And she told him about me coming to the house for a second pack. He said he didn't send me for a second pack. Well, I was in trouble.

My punishment for lying and making up such a story was that I didn't get to set at the dinner table with all of the big tough hay haulers. I had to sit in the corner of the kitchen and look at the wall and eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. They all had roast beef.

As I remember, that was my first time trying to smoke.

Little Lamb

The first pet I ever had was a lamb named Duz. He was named after a popular laundry detergent at the time. His wool was as white as freshly laundered bed sheets ... and that was the theme of the laundry detergent.

I don't remember where we got him and I don't know that I ever even knew where he came from. But we got him when he was just a baby. I do remember being told that his mother sheep had died and dad brought him home from one of our neighbors. I had to feed him warm milk from a glass bottle with a rubber nipple. I remember how cute he looked when he was "nursing." Slobbers included!

As he grew he became more frisky with every passing day. And of course he was puttin' on the pounds. As lambs, sheep, and goats will do, he began to "butt" me with his head and anyone else that looked like a good target. When I would ride an old beat-up-hand-me-down tricycle he began to "butt" me off and turn me over. Well as he grew larger the "butts" became harder and harder and more severe. One day he "butted" me really hard and then began to maul me and dad had to come to my rescue. I remember at the supper table that night mom and dad talking about what to do with the lamb, now grown into a sheep. Dad told mom and me that he thought he would just take Duz to town. Well, little did I know at the time what that meant.

I thought taking Duz to town was a great idea. Then he could run all around town up and down the streets playing with the dogs and cats and anything else that was interested. I wanted to go with dad when he "took him to town," but dad said no ... he had to do this by himself.

For a short time after dad took the lamb away and we went to town, I would want dad to drive around and see if we could find Duz. That happened a couple of times and I soon forgot about him.

Well, as time passed, I later learned that when a farmer talks about taking something "to town," it didn't mean what I thought it meant. When a farmer talks about taking something "to town," he is referring to either a grain elevator, if it is a crop, or he is referring to taking livestock to the slaughter house.

"Oh my," I thought, when I learned what the real meaning was when dad said, "I think I'll just take him to town."

(I have a picture of me feeding Duz with a bottle and if I can find it I will try to put it by this post.)

Remembering the House on the Farm

The house I grew up in was located on a knolly hilltop overlooking the west forty acres near Sni Creek. The house was a two-story, five room, clapboard siding, with a front and back porch. No basement or garage, just a basic house. The kitchen, a living room, and a front room were on the first floor. Two bedrooms were located on the second floor. No plumbing. We had a two-holler outhouse out back and a "thunder bucket" for use inside the house when we couldn't go outside. We did have limited electricity with one ceiling light in the kitchen and one ceiling light in the living room. The rest of the rooms were illuminated with kerosene lamps. Our heating system was a wood-burning cook stove in the kitchen and a wood-burning stove in the living room. The rest of the rooms had no heat source and were cold as hell in the winter and hot as hell in the summer. (By the way ... is hell "hot" or "cold?")

My brother and I slept in the same bed upstairs, my two sisters slept in a bed together ... all in the same room. My parents used the other bedroom for their own. Sleeping conditions were tricky ... especially when getting up or gowing to bed. I guess the "sleeping" part was okay.

The outhouse was a real trip. It was about one hundred feet from the house with a board walk to it. It stunk to high heaven in the summer time. You had to hold your breath when you went in to do your business. Instead of having nice soft toilet paper we had the Sears Roebuck mail order catalog ... OUCH! Anyway, I will never forget going to the outhouse! For that matter I will never forget using the "thunder bucket."

There was no insulation in the house so the wind blew through with little resistance. Sometimes the curtains would swing and sway as the wind blew. It was especially uncomfortable in the winter time.

Our water source was a fresh water well just outside the kitchen window. There a pump handle at the sink in the kitchen and another one on the back porch.

The house is still standing today and is probably near or over one-hundred years old. I can tell by looking at it from the outside it has been remodeled since I lived there. It's probably been remodeled several times through the years.

I remember good times in the old farm house and I guess that is all that really matters.

Milk ..... YUK !!!

My dad have several animals on the farm. He had milk cows, beef cattle, work horses and hogs. In addition to these animals there were also two or three dogs, several cats, some chickens, and one pet lamb named Duz. Duz was named after a popular laundry detergent because his wool was so white.

Dad kept the milk cows so we could have milk to drink and to sell milk to a dairy Co-op to generate some income. There was a milk barn where dad and my brother milked the cows by hand. Later on dad bought an electric-powered milking machine that made the milking of the cows faster and more efficient. When dad bought this machine it was "the news of the day" all over eastern Jackson county. It was a step toward modernization that only one other farmer in the area had taken.

I used to go to the milk barn early in the morning when dad and my brother were milking. And on a cold winter morning nothing tasted better than a tin cup of warm foamy milk straight from the cow. Of course my brother would squirt me from time to time and that of course made me mad and I would throw something at him. There was always a small war going on between me and my older brother. Through the years I began to not like milk and I think it is related to the "warm milk mornings." To this day I can't stand to drink a glass of milk ... even with cookies. I don't remember the last time I drank a glass of milk. It has probably been over forty years. To this day I can't stand to drink a glass of milk or watch anyone else drink a glass of milk. However, I do like milk on a bowl of cereal. Weeeeeeiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrrddddddddddddddddddd !!!

Early On

Some of my earliest memories, when I was about five years old, was looking out a kitchen window and watching my dad leave to go to town on the tractor and then waiting for him to return. It was six miles to town so the round trip too quite some time. Upon his return he always brought me a pack of Juicy Fruit chewing gum. It was a real treat for me and it cost him a whopping three cents a pack.

Another early memory is climbing trees in our backyard. I remember I liked to climb as high as I could to where the limbs would actually sway, sit on a limb, and sing like a bird! I have a photo of me sitting high atop my favorite tree.

Two scary events remain in my memory. One event was my falling off the back of my dads tractor and landing on a piece of farm machinery and splitting my tongue wide open, about an inch long. I bled profusely. I nearly bled to death before my parents could get me to a hospital in Independence, Missouri. There was no ambulance to call and the 911 emergency system didn't exist. They transported me in the trusty old 1934 Pontiac that would run all of thirty miles an hour downhill on a windy day! I barely survived and was in the hospital for an extended stay. I remember drinking liquids through a straw for months because I couldn't eat any solid foods until my tongue healed.

The other scary event was when I sat down on a hornets nest on an old hay bailer. Again, I nearly died before my parents could get me to the doctor in Oak Grove. My brother rescued me from the hornets and sustained several stings himself. To this day I am extremely allergic to any kind of insect sting, especially a sting from a hornet, wasp, or bee.