Pioneer Living Survival

When I was growing up here in the Ozarks, many people did not have full time jobs. a good part of them did not have running water or plumbing , but most had electricity. Times were rough for us, and a lot of other people, but we didn't realize just how poor we were, because most everyone was in the same boat. There were a lot of times Dad didn't make $5 a week, but we always got by.

My father worked at a local boat factory until I was ten.  They would work six days a week during the winter, but they would lay off around the last of March until sometime around Labor Day. Dad loved it that way, as it gave him all summer to fish, and help Grandpa around the farm.

Grandpa planted almost 3 acres of garden. Half was planted as a truck patch to sell, and to trade for things they needed. The other half was for the family. We "paid" for ours by helping in the garden pulling weeds and pickin' beans. We lived on a small lot in town, and had no room to grow much.

Friendship and comradriere was always important. Mom kept a journal, and wrote in it every day. I found them the other day while going through some papers. In the 1963 journal, hardly a day passed during that summer that we were not with our friends, the Pages, Davisons, and the Harrouns. We worked togather, and played togather, and ate togather. Some day, I'll have to tell you about eating purple spagetti.

Putting up hay was the job I liked the least. Grandpa didn't bale hay, he put it up loose, and mainly with old equipment. Raking was done with a dump rake pulled behind the A Farmall Grandpa owned. It required someone riding the rake to "dump" the hay in a row. Then it was thrown in the wagon by pitchfork, and unloaded in the barn the same way. What didn't fit in the barn was put in a big pile outside, and covered with a tarp.

To be continued.......................