REMINISCING ABOUT THE FARM

The material included in this environmental report is but a small portion of the wealth of material available in this locale that could be used in writing fiction about the farm. I have related some incidents as I recall them in my own memory and from my own experiences in growing up on the farm, with the information about the earlier years being supplied by my mother. These incidents cover the period from 1913-1929.

Mother and Dad moved onto an eighty acre plot of woodland in Marathon County, Wisconsin in 1913. This "spot", which was to become such a focal point in our lives was located 8 miles from Merrill and 13 miles from Wausau. Their goal and purpose was to clear the greater part of this land of its trees and make a farm. Their future lay in the success of this task, which was not a small one.

A small area was first cleared where a small log house was built. This was to be their temporary home while more land was cleared and a bigger house built. Dad also did some carpenter work during this time for an income, mostly building barns in the neighborhood. Since many people were settling in this area at this time, there were many barns to be built. The day of the "barnraising" was a community affair, where all the men came to help build and the women came along to help cook and visit.

Cutting down the trees, sawing them up, digging out the stumps, and breaking the land and picking rocks was no small job with the limited machinery and tools available at that time. Mother worked along, many times doing the work of a man. About every two years, a new baby was born, until there were 7 in all, all girls, which was quite a disappointment for Dad, as he was looking forward to help on the farm. Even though we were not boys, as we grew up, each of us had to do his share to help with the work as much as we could.

Money was very scarce, and I remember growing up with the idea always before me that there wasn't enough money. It took a lot to clothe and feed a family of 7 children. Mother sewed all of our clothes, and since we were all girls, it was handed down the line as we outgrew them, so nothing was wasted there. As soon as we were old enough, each of us was taught to sew, knit and crochet, so we could help along with the endless task of sewing dresses and knitting stockings. Slacks were unheard of at that time, and we all wore black home-knit woolen stockings, for which the wool first had to be cleaned and spun. Much of this work was done in the evening by the light of kerosene lamps.

We seldom got to town. When we needed shoes, Mother would trace around our foot on a piece of paper and Dad would take this paper along to town so he would get the right size. I remember getting a pair of new shoes as a child, and each night before going to bed, I would take them out of the box in the closet, polish and feel of them, and smell them. I liked the smell of new leather, and even now, when I smell new shoes, I am transported back to those days when a pair of shoes made me so happy.

There was work for all of us on the farm, from the oldest to the youngest. I was one of the younger ones, and on Saturday, when the older girls were busy with cleaning and scrubbing, we wanted to be included too, so we were given jobs like washing the table legs, cleaning the iron grill work on the sewing machine, and we even washed the handle of the corn broom.

Washing was done by hand on a scrub board. This Mother usually did, but later when we had a hand operated wash machine, we all took our turns at pumping. Still later we got a Maytag washer with a gasoline motor, since we had no electricity. This was a great improvement, even though Mother had trouble starting it and we would often have to go way out to the field to get Dad to start it. We always had a big ironing, since we always wore dresses, and with all the different types of work we had to do, they didn't stay clean very long. The irons were the old-fashioned kind that were heated on top of a wood-burning kitchen range. We had two sets of these, so two of us always ironed at the same time. On a hot summer day, it was none too pleasant to get the stove good and hot so the irons would be hot enough for ironing. This was quite a trick to get them hot enough, but not so hot that they would scorch the clothes.

We went barefoot most of the summer. We liked it that way because we could run faster. It was also cheaper than buying shoes for us. But when the day was over, and we had to wash our feet before going to bed, we were sorry we hadn't worn shoes. This practice of going barefoot resulted in many stubbed toes, and many were the times in our running around that we stepped on nails and were stung by bees.

When Mother was in her 30's, she was sick a great deal. She had gall bladder trouble and would get terrible attacks, usually in the night. I remember clearly one night (I was 4 years old at the time) when she had one of these attacks. Dad had to run to the neighbors about a quarter of a mile to call the doctor. This was the only telephone in the neighborhood. My older sisters were heating bricks and bran sacks in the oven, which were to serve as a heating pad. The smaller children, to which group I belonged, were all up and underfoot and were crying because we were afraid Mother would die. We were finally sent to bed and told to pray. My family was quite religious, but I had never been taught how to pray, except for the table prayer we always said, and that for the younger ones was merely "Abba, Father, Amen". I remember wondering how this could keep Mother alive, but I nevertheless did as I was told, and prayed "Abba, Father, Amen" over and over again. The Lord did hear my prayer, because today, 50 years later, Mother is still living.

One summer in the 1930's we experienced a great drought. Week after week it didn't rain. Crops didn't grow, and what little there was, was devoured by hordes of grasshoppers. No green grass could be seen anywhere. All was brown and crunchy. First we chopped down trees in the pasture and woods so the cattle could eat the leaves. This, however, was not enough to save them. They got thin and gave very little milk. Some friends on a farm near Green Bay offered to take them and feed them through the winter, since we had no feed for them. They took the milk and the new calves as their pay. This was the only way we could save them. One good milk cow was sold for $8 to get a little cash. In the spring, they returned the cows to us again.

It was during this same summer that my two younger sisters and I decided to try our hand at helping the financial situation along. We were sent to the pasture day after day, to sit there and watch so the neighbor's sheep didn't come through our fence and eat what little grass was available, for after sheep have grazed, there is nothing left for cows. While we were absorbed in play, the sheep did come through the fence, and before we noticed, were peacefully eating in our pasture. When we saw them, we chased them back as fast as we could. It was then that we noticed they had left some of their fleece on the prickly wire fence, and one of us got the idea to pick it off and save it. After that, it was our express purpose to allow the sheep to come through the fence so we could chase them back and gather the wool. This went on for the remainder of the time we were "sheep herders", and we had gathered somewhat less than a half gunny sack full of wool. Proudly we brought this home, showing it to Mother and suggesting that she take it to town to sell it. She hung the sack in the basement, but that's as far as it ever got. The price of wool was so low, it didn't pay to even try to sell it. So all our efforts were in vain.

We were typical girls in that we didn't care to work in the fields. This, however, was no excuse, and we had to help along where we could. When Dad plowed, to prepare the fields for planting, we had to walk along behind the plow and pick the rocks out of the furrow, so they wouldn't get plowed under again. I remember thinking that adults weren't always so smart. If we'd let the rocks get plowed under we wouldn't have to pick them up later, not realizing that they'd be brought to the top later by the drag or cultivator. This routine got to be very monotonous and we were happy for dinner time so we got a break. About the worst job of all was rock picking. After Dad would drag the newly plowed land, and before planting, several days were spent to pick the rocks. We were blessed with an unusually rocky piece of land for a farm. Everyone in the family had to help with this. As we were quite young, we'd much rather play, and each time we filled a wagon load and Dad would take it to the rock pile to unload, we would quickly play a little bit in the pasture near by. Dad was really very good to us. He expected us to help him, but where he could, he'd do the work and let us off.

Other jobs we helped with were shocking hay, digging potatoes, and the never-ending job of getting the cows. Dad would do this in the morning, but in the evening it was our job. Our faithful dog would usually accompany us and make the task more pleasant. All the work that had to be done with the horses, Dad usually took care of, such as plowing, cultivating, dragging, cutting the hay, and the like. For hauling in hay, one of the older girls would drive the horses.

It seemed like we three younger ones had all the odd jobs to do. We were sent up and down the corn rows when the corn was just coming up to pick up the cutworms. Then we went to the potato patch to pick the potato bugs off the plants. For this job, which was backbreaking enough, we were to be paid a penny a hundred. So after a long tedious day of gathering bugs in a baking powder can, we would sit down and count them one by one and smash them on a rock as we did so. This was a juicy business! I remember Mother was pleased with the large amount of bugs we had and wanted to scald them with boiling water, but we were not satisfied with this. How would we know then how many we had? We never did get our pennies we had earned, but the potatoes certainly were much better off! I believe the main purpose of these jobs was to keep us occupied and out from under foot and at the same time do something a little useful. Today these jobs are done with DDT. According to the great amount of controversy over this insecticide, the method is not as good as ours was!

When the raspberries were ripe, we were not around much either. Then Mother would pack us a lunch of home-made bread and home-made sausage and send us to the woods with numerous pails to pick berries. We would stay all day. If the smallest one was too young to pick berries, she would be penned up to play in a sort of cage-like affair that had once been used to plant ginseng. What peaceful days these must have been for Mother. At noon we'd mix some of our berries with sugar to make jam, and we'd eat our lunch of jam bread and sausage under some big beautiful shade tree where we had made our headquarters for the day. The older girls were our taskmasters, so we didn't get much of a chance to be lazy. This went on day after day during berry season. I remember one day when berry season was about over and we were picking the last few, I had a small baking powder can which I was trying to fill but just couldn't find enough berries. I was told that we could quit as soon as I had that filled. But I was lazy and not in the mood and just couldn't find any more berries. I finally decided to fill my can with leaves and picked just enough berries on top to cover the leaves. I thought this was real ingenious and I did fool my sister and we did go home. It was the only way I knew of getting out of the woods that day. We had many interesting berry-picking experiences. If one of us ran across a gooseberry bush with ripe gooseberries, we'd call out a lingo we had made up in German and everyone would come running and we'd all take a break and eat ripe gooseberries until the bush was empty. Then we'd resume our picking.

We always had sort of a contest going to see who could pick the fastest. One day the cows found our pails. We had neglected to hang them in the tree. This was a real feast for them as they cleaned up two 14-quart pails full of raspberries. We were quite dejected, but "what's done is done", so we had to go home almost empty handed that night. I don't believe Mother even cared too much as she always had the task of canning all these berries. She often canned as many as 100 quarts in a summer. Spending so much time outdoors and in the woods made us more aware of the beauties of nature. To this day, we all appreciate nature and like to be outdoors, watching the birds, hiking in the woods, picking flowers and berries like we used to when we were young. In fact, I have a few sisters who enjoy it so much that I think they should have been Indians.

Hauling in hay was one of the harder jobs on the farm, because it was all done by hand. Dad would pitch the hay onto the wagon, but we would have to distribute it on the load and drive the horses. Later when we got a hayloader, it was much easier. This was really something wonderful, we thought. It was new too. Most of our machinery was purchased second-hand, and Dad was forever having to fix it.

At the end of a hot day in the hay field, we were often rewarded with a bottle of home-made root beer. First, though we had to carry water from the pump into a wash tub under the shade tree, where the bottles were placed for a time to get cool. This was a hard job, for a pail full of water is not easy for an adult to carry, let alone small children. Then too, the pump was down the hill, quite a distance away from the house. We would then go to the strawstack in the barnyard and pick out a nice clean piece of straw through which we could later drink our root beer. Real straws were a luxury which we could not afford.

In our machine shed stood a really fancy horse-drawn surrey. It had side curtains for bad weather, and a light on each side, enclosed with red glass. This was a pleasure carriage, and was our method of transportation when we went to church or visiting before we had a car. There wasn't room for all of us to sit, so a younger sister and I always had to stand in the back, in front of the older ones who sat on the seat, while the baby sat on Mother's lap. There was a metal grab bar across the back of the front seat where we could hang on. This bar had a rough ridge where it was put together, and as we bumped over the rough muddy roads, our white organdy dresses rubbed on it and made little "pulls" in the material. These were our Sunday dresses and were washed and ironed every week, and I remember Mother wondering about what we had done to get all these little "pulls" in our dresses. We finally figured it out that this was caused by the bar in the surrey.

When I graduated from eighth grade in country school, we had to go to a centrally located school 8 miles away to write county exams. Mother took a neighbor girl and me in the surrey, stayed there all day and waited for us, and then brought us home again. We had a car then already, but Mother couldn't drive and Dad was too busy to take us.

One of our first cars was a Model T Ford. This was a real treat, but we had trouble getting up hills with it. We never had this problem with the horses! Many a time Dad had to back down, take a run for it and try again. Here we had the same space problem. There always seemed to be room for all except Norma and me. My youngest sister always sat on Mother's lap and we two had to stand. I suppose my older sisters wouldn't consider holding us on their laps as we'd wrinkle their dresses. This was before the days of "wash and wear"! Finally Dad made two little benches for us and we put them in the back, one on each side by the door. So now we could sit too when we went somewhere in the car.

In this connection too, I remember that there weren't enough chairs for all of us to sit at the table to eat. No one thought much of it, as we three youngest ones just stood behind the table to eat. We had never done it any other way and just accepted it. I suppose we figured that when we'd "get big" we could sit too. One day when an uncle was visiting us, he saw this and felt sorry for us. He went home and made a wooden bench for us that would fit behind the table and not take so much room From then on we always sat on the bench to eat. The table was also home-made. This bench and table are still in existence. One of my sisters, the only one of us who landed on a farm, could make use of them and still has them.

The house we lived in was built in two parts. The first part was really quite large, but as the family got bigger, it wasn't large enough, so Dad added another part to it. In the first part, we just had an old-fashioned wood heater, for which we carried in wood every night. It was cold upstairs, as there was no heat up there. In winter we would dress and undress in the living room around the heater. When the second part was added, we had a floor furnace. This was quite an improvement, but we still had to carry in wood, only more!

Nothing was fancy in our house, but it was always clean and homey. Much of the furniture was made by Dad. We had a big home-made kitchen cupboard, where we kept the everyday dishes. The bottom part of this served as a sink where we washed the dishes, with a space for kettles underneath. The sink was lined with a galvanized metal. One evening we had company for supper, -a lady from the city. After supper, while my parents and older sisters were in the barn doing chores, this lady, who was a stranger to us, helped with the dishes. Since we were quite small, she washed and we wiped. When she finished washing, she poured all the dish water into the sink, no doubt thinking of her sink in town with a drain. We were horrified to say the least, and had to get busy and dip this water all out and dry it out before it would all run into the kettles below, as the corners were not water tight. We decided that people in the city must know very little really!

Our dining room table and chairs were purchased by my parents at the time of their marriage. They paid $12 for the table and $1.65 for each chair, of which there were 6. This set is almost 60 years old and we are still using it. Mother is sentimental about it. She says we all grew up around the table and have our marks on the chairs.

When I was 8 years old, we went to a cousin's wedding across the river from where we lived. We crossed the river on a hand operated ferry at Granite Heights, Wisconsin. This ferry was installed here for the purpose of hauling red granite from the quarries in the Town of Maine across the Wisconsin River to the polishing mill in Granite Heights. Much of the red granite used in the old Marathon County courthouse was cut and polished at this mill. In later years, the mill was moved to Wausau, but the once flourishing village of Granite Heights is still there today, but without a thriving industry. This village was at one time also a postal station where the farmers from all around came to pick up their mail before the time of rural mail delivery.

This hand operated ferry could be used for other purposes too, and it meant quite a short cut for us if we didn't have to drive all the way around by way of Merrill. In earlier days, before we had a car, we always crossed the river in this way by team. When we went to this wedding, however, we already had a car. The bank of the river on the other side was too steep and sandy to drive the car up, so Dad parked it by the river and we walked the rest of the way to the wedding, probably about a fourth of a mile. This was an old-time country wedding, and is lasted all night, with a barn dance and all.

As an eight year old, I didn't have too much of an interest in the dancing, but I sat and watched and listened to the music until I got tired. I remember hearing the then popular piece "Ramona" played over and over. It is still drumming in my ears. I finally went in search of a place to sleep, but found all the beds full of coats and babies. I don't remember how I spent the rest of the night, but at 4:00 A.M. my folks finally decided to go home, so we walked down to the river, (I remember I was so tired I could hardly walk) worked the ferry across the river, and got home just as the sun was coming up. We changed clothes and did our chores first and then went to bed. We missed church very seldom, but this Sunday we all slept until dinner.

Both of my parents were of German descent. Dad came from Germany at a young age, but Mother was born over here. We spoke low German at home and when it was time for us to start school, we knew very few English words. The teachers must have had quite a time with us. I remember in class one day my younger sister was telling the class all the vegetables that went into the making of vegetable soup, and was listing them all in German. I'm sure this was a common occurrence with us.

Religion played an important part in our home. We attended church regularly, even though there were always seven of us to get ready, and we had four miles to go by team. When we were about eight years old, we were enrolled in religious instruction. This was held on Saturday, so we walked four miles, one way, every Saturday in all kinds of weather. For another month after public school was out, we went daily until we were old enough to be confirmed. I went through this ordeal for six years, but I can't remember that I ever really minded it. This is the way it was and we didn't question it. However, it wasn't always Mother's idea to let us go so young, but we begged to go because there were always older ones going. Many times we would come home so late it was dark already, and Mother would be coming through the orchard with the flashlight to meet us. Of course, we often made the four miles stretch into more by all the extra steps we took up and down the snowbanks in winter. Often one or the other would get stuck in the snow and would lose a shoe or boot and we would have to take time to dig it out. Sometimes, out of sheer monotony, we would alternately run and walk the distance between two telephone posts. This would bring us home sooner. Mother always warned us to never ride with strangers, so whenever we'd see a car coming, we'd hide in the ditch, behind bushes, or behind the snow fence. We'd never even give the stranger a chance to see us. Of course, this practice delayed us and we would get home later.

All seven of us were born at home. It was unthinkable to go to a hospital for this. Each time a new baby was expected, the neighbor lady would come over to act as doctor, nurse and midwife, and all the children were sent across the road to the neighbors. When their children were born, this was reversed. Mother had the worst part of the bargain, however, as they had 14 children.

Because of the inconvenience of travel, and often the cold weather, we were baptized in the house. I remember my youngest sister's baptism very clearly. I was five years old at the time. During the short service in the living room, I stood in the doorway, refusing to go in because she cried all the while, and I was thoroughly ashamed of her.

Mother still laughs about the day the apple tree peddler stopped at our house. Either Dad was very gullible or the peddler was another Johnny Appleseed. At least he succeeded in selling Dad about sixty young fruit trees, -apple, plum, and cherry, but mostly apple. When these trees all matured and bore apples, we were literally swamped with apples. There were more than enough apples for the cows, the pigs, the neighbors, and for us. Besides, we put an ad in the Merrill Daily Herald, and people came from town and took all they could use. Still so many went to waste. But what a beautiful place the orchard was and what a delightful smell when all the blossoms were out. There were apple trees all over the place. About a dozen were on part of the lawn, 20 or more were in the chicken fence, and the rest were in a meadow near the house. We have often said that we'd be happy now with just one or two of those trees in our back yard now.

Later on, Dad became interested in bees, and he bought a few swarms. Mother often took care of them too, but besides eating the honey, we children had little use for them because they caused us all sorts of trouble. We would get stung occasionally, but we didn't mind that as much as when they decided to swarm. Then we'd all run out with kettles and dishpans and pails or water, and run after them all over the 80 acres, beating on the kettles and dishpans and throwing water over them, so they would settle down somewhere. Then Dad would bring an empty hive, shake them in, and bring them back home and the swarm was saved. We were told that all this racket and pouring of water would make them think it was thundering and raining, and they would settle down sooner. To this day, I don't know if that was really true, or if it was only a superstition. At any rate, we knew that a swarm of bees was worth $6, and everytime this happened, we could just see the money flying away, because many times we were not able to save the swarm, because they flew too far away or settled too high up in a tree.

When we were old enough to go out and work, we would find jobs doing housework. This was by far the best way to learn to work. Since there were so many of us, we were always in demand, and always one or the other was "helping out" somewhere. My first job was being second maid for a rich family in Merrill. I was 15 at the time, and since I was in high school at the time, I could work only during the summer. My wages were $3 a week, payable every two weeks. From my first pay check I bought what was probably my first ready-made dress for $5.98. I remember what a thrill I got out of this, and I appreciated it all the more because it was purchased with the first money I ever earned. During this summer, I also saw my first movie, a Sunday afternoon matinee with Shirley Temple. The cost of the movie was 25 cents. Even at that price, my sister and I walked back and forth in front of the theater, trying to decide whether or not we ought to spend the money.

Later, my three older sisters went to Milwaukee to work in the kitchen at Concordia College. Here they earned $8 a week. Out of these small earnings, they sent money home to help pay for cow feed, as milk was cheap and feed was high, and Mother and Dad were having a hard time making ends meet. They also managed to send some money to my sister and me while we were in high school. We worked for our board and room, but needed spending money for school supplies.

While we were attending high school, we often walked the 13 miles home on weekends. We doctored many a blister on the way, often by putting green leaves in our shoes for want of anything better. One stormy Saturday in winter, we afforded ourselves the luxury of taking the train. This was our first train ride and we were plenty "green". When we reached the village of Brokaw and the conductor called out the name of the village, we thought he was saying "roll call" and were really quite worried for awhile, wondering what would be expected of us. There was no station out there in the country, and the train stopped right at a crossing about two miles from home and let us off in the dark and in a snowstorm. Luckily, Dad was there with the horses and sleigh to meet us. The next day Dad walked with us down to this same crossing, where he flagged the train for us to go back. I remember him sitting on his knees with his ear on the track, listening to see if he could hear the train coming. Dad came back to Wausau with us on the train that night as he had some business to attend to. He stayed at an uncle's house overnight and walked back home the next day. We really got our education the hard way, but we were none the worse off for all these experiences.

We had an old log barn that Dad had built, hoping to replace it before too long with a better one. It was really a group of small barns and sheds all fastened together, to serve as cow barn, hay barn, pig barn, and machine shed. Plans were underway to build a new barn. The timbers were all cut and ready, but it didn't work out that way. In the winter of 1935, Dad fell while working on the road for the county, and hurt his back. From this injury he died the following summer, which was to be the summer for the building of the new barn.

Then followed three hard years when we tried to manage the farm without Dad. We could see that it wouldn't work, so Mother decided to have an auction, get what she could for the personal property, of which there wasn't much, and move to town. The farm was mortgaged, and since we couldn't meet the payments, we lost it. We had the option to buy it for a very reasonable price, but we had neither the money nor the help to work it, so it was useless. So ended 26 years of struggle on this wooded tract of land to make it into a farm. The irony of it is that after Mother and Dad had spent the greater part of their life there cutting down trees and clearing land, the new owner made it into a tree farm.

We all felt bad about the way things turned out, but even now, thirty years later, we enjoy driving by "the farm" and reminiscing. We were never very prosperous, and certainly never got rich, but we were happy most of the time, we made a living, and did our small part in helping to settle this part of our country. We have many pleasant memories.

By today our family has grown quite a lot larger. We are 31 in number, with Mother still being the "head" of our clan. She will celebrate her 81st birthday next September, God willing. As a family, we are closely knit and enjoy togetherness. We credit this to Godly parents and to the environment in which we were brought up.