Having been encouraged to write down some experiences that have brought me to my 76th year I will attempt to post them starting at about age 8-9. We were taught a good work ethic early on. Prior to this we would milk cows (by hand) and various farm chores. Our neighbor needed help with his turkey farm from time to time. My brother and I would be called out at any hour (sometimes at 3-4 in the morning}. The neighbor, not having any children that could help yet, had contacted my parents for assistance. As they had 12 it was easy for my parents to spare some workers. So off we would trudge across the field/pasture to work with the turkeys. Be it health issues like shots/debeaking or artificial insemination it all paid the same. In the fall it was to capture the birds for loading trucks for the shipping to processing plants. We were rewarded with a great meal and good Christian company. Need I say we were paid well also, if I remember right, over $1.50 per hour. The sense of accomplishment and satisfaction of a job well done was as much a reward as the pay.

Farm work was a great way to learn responsibility. Aside from milking there was barn cleaning wood cutting/splitting and hauling getting ready for winter. Some of the best memories were of harvest time when we would not only thresh our own crops but would go around to several neighbors to do custom work as dad owned the threshing rig. One of my tasks was, at age 11-12, to drive the bundle team hauling the shocks to the rig to be thrashed. The shocks were in the field and you would drive down the rows with workers loading them on the hayrack. When full you would drive in to the rig and unload. The only downside of this was that at the end of the day everyone got to go into a great meal after the rig shut down. But having the team of horses to care for first made us last to eat. As time went on and we started sports activities in school this became a challenge as we needed to do our chores first and fit in sports when it was possible.

Installment 2 coming soon. Starting with hiring out for the summer.

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