My Early Childhood Memories
Written February 1964 at age 45 (our home)
My earliest recollections of my childhood are vague. Of course, the only home I have ever known was the yellow brick home which I now live in. It has been a wonderful home for me, first while I was a child growing up, and later for my husband and I and our children. There have been a great many changes made around the old home. As a child, I remember the apple orchard east of the house. Gradually those trees were taken out to make way for more garden space. Mother always kept a strip on the far east side of the garden for a lucern patch so her old hens could have some fresh greens in their diet each day. There was a high board fence that separated the coral and barn from the garden area. Against the fence was the garnary and the old Privy (for cases of emergency when the water-works in the house weren’t functioning properly.)
Chicken Coup and the “old hens”
The chicken coup, which was built later, was considered very deluxe for that time—cement floor, and adobe walls with a sloping tin roof. There were two rooms for all Mother’s old hens and there were little doors which would allow the chickens to go in and out of the coral and barn. The windows in the coup were screen wire and they faced the south. One of my jobs as a little girl was to take water and scraps to the chickens. There was a barrel of wheat and “laying mash” which had to be put out also. On cold winter mornings, mother would heat the scraps, put the “laying mash” in and take the “delicacy” out to her pets steaming hot. As a result of her diligent daily care, she would garner her reward—an egg a day from each old hen—and she was just as diligent in collecting her pay. If at any time the old “sisters” reached the point where they became lazy in their duties, her loyalty for them immediately stopped and they were soon ready for the ax and the Sunday chicken dinner.
The Barn
The barn was an important part of our place. Dad always kept a cow or so and I remember well when he milked many cows in the station to sell milk for the Cooperative Dairy. I remember the fun we had jumping from the loft of the barn—down into the stichery hay. Mayola, my oldest sister, used to “dare me” to jump from high places. I could never stand a “dare”—so would bravely sail through the air. I don’t remember ever seeing her jump—she always complained that it was “too high”—after I had jumped.
The Bull and my Red Checkered Dress
I remember well, the time we had a furious looking bull in the coral and we children were romping in the barn trying to excite the old bull. I had a red checkered dress on and nothing would do (Mayola always engineered all these daring feats), but that I take off my dress and let her wave it on a pitchfork in front of the bull. The sad thing was the bull hooked the dress in his horns and raced around and around the coral. The dress wasn’t recovered that day—Mother had to come rescue us. The barn was the favorite place for the hens to hatch their eggs and it was fun to hunt the eggs in the hay. I remember also practicing my singing on the cows—how they blinked their eyes and acted as though they enjoyed the music. This always spurred me on to great volume and expression.
Trees and Bushes Around the Place
There were currant bushes which lined the ditches and gooseberry bushes hid the back of the coop. At the back of the coop, Mother planted a grape arbor. On the south side of the lot, along the fence were plum trees, which each year outdid themselves in a harvest of red plums. The pear trees were a favorite spot for us as we grew up. I well remember hiding in the top most branches to get out of a patch of dishes. They (the pear trees) stood right out the back door. There was always a swing of sum kind—often and old tire swing, and dad kept fresh sand in our sand-box. Our sand pile was under the pear trees—we had it laid out in farms and used to pop bottles for horses. We cut their harnesses from old inner tubes We usually had several neighborhood kids there to play. (I remember when we would run away from home—Mother would tie us to the pear trees) Our place located as it was, was a center for neighborhood games, Run Sheep Run, Hide-n’-Seek, New York, or handsprings and cartwheels on the lawn. I remember the never failing harvest of wormy pears we got each year. So much we couldn’t care for them. We had to gather them and feed them to the pigs.