And I remember seeing last year's copy in the outhouse next to the Sears and Wards catalogues!
That was after the peach papers (soft tissue that were wrapped around individual peaches to protect them in the shipping crates) ran out after canning season. IIRC, some of them were purple colored and might have left a little stain on fingers (and other delicate parts) but we didn’t care. If you were lucky, the outhouse was a two-holer. The 40 yard path through two feet of snow was very narrow, making after-dark passing someone returning while you were outgoing interesting. The grandparents had a “thunder mug”… guess whose chore it was to empty in the morning…
I remember my Danish immigrant grandfather working his farm with horses until he retired from farming in the 1960s. As pre-teens, my brother and I helped with putting up the loose hay into the barn haymow via his horse drawn pulley/rope and hay fork system. Threshing season was a community affair with farmers helping each other in turn… the huge lunch spreads for all hands were spectacular! Wash up on the porch dipping rain-barrel water out of big buckets into wash pans, lye soap and hand towels made from grain sacks. Such great memories.
My grandpa was short and stout, and the strongest, toughest man I knew. He said his Minnesota farm grew more than corn, wheat, and hay… lots of rocks too. We’d go with him in the spring when he hitched the horses to a simple sledge and he’d load the newly emerging rocks onto it. Some were huge… “boulders“ in my mind, but he could wrestle them into submission. The loads were then piled along the fence line. He’d been doing it for years so the running mound was long and high. My brother and I have his hands… short and stubby but never with the lifetime calluses like his. I always remember them as soft to the touch though.
As high schoolers we formed crews during hay bailing season and worked for a penny a bail or $1 an hour. You didn’t want to throw damp round bales, dry square ones were best. This was usually between morning and evening football practices. Damn, we were in good physical shape!
Thanks for listening.
John
I just seen this today.
