I was born in April of 1941, significant because six months later the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and the United States got into World War II. I was raised on a farm. Rarely met any kids my own age, until I started the first grade. Being with all those kids my age was overwhelming then.

About all I had for companionship was a dog about my age. So I developed both my imagination and my love of animals. My father was 37 in 1944. The War kept gobbling up men, and the draft was approaching his age group. He was married with two young children. But still the draft was a worry. However the Government, with more than its usual wisdom, decided that Father was more important to the war effort farming than toting a gun.

The War was a time of shortages. Father, as well as many other farmers, farmed with horses. I was old to remember the last horse he bought after the War. He bought a big bay up to the back door of the house. And it tried to come in. I remember it as nine foot tall. But it got its head in the doorway and I doubt the door was over 7 foot tall.

Mother had trouble getting enough sugar to cook with. We had three hives
of bees to produce honey. The hives were by the house. Until I was five. I went out and rapped on them with a stick. The hives them went to the back of the garden. Mother says I was white as a sheet. She must have pulled over 100 stings out out of me. She was afraid I was dead. Bee stings are supposed to prevent arthritis. But, if so, they wore off a long ago. I've had arthritis for just over 40 years now, as of 2005.

Father had attended Michigan State College about 1926. MSC then had a one semester set of classes for farmers called the Short Form. He was the back up center for the Short Form Baseball Team the year they went undefeated. In those days, 6 foot tall was enough for centers.

He was not the sort to dwell on past glories. I never knew about this until after his death (cancer, 1975) when I was going through his papers and found a set of clippings he had saved.

Father bought a petigreed [sp] bull about 1948. The bull turned out to have Bang's Disease. The bull and nearly all the cows were killed and buried. This was the good old days, So the government saw to it that the animals were killed. But Father never got a penny for them. I don't think he was ever the same. He had went into debt to build the farm up, and had less than nothing to show for it.

The old farm house had 11 rooms and a built-in woodshed. My brother and I
had the five rooms upstair as well as an enclosed porch over the front porch. Two of the bedrooms were over the living room and heated by registers above the living room stove. In 1953, Grandfather, who owned the farm, had remarried. "Auntie Em" decided she wanted a taste of country life. So we had to move. I was 12, and the move was only 15 miles. But it cut me off from the kids I knew.

Mother tried to talk Father into spending more on a new farm. But after the Bang's Disease episode, he was cautious. We got a six-room house on 80 acres with one barn, when the old place had three barns and an orchard on 120 acres. The house had no indoor plumbing, running water, nor central heat.

Just as Father had put the electricity and plumbing for grandfather's farmhouse, he put in plumbing, running water, and central heat as well as rewiring the place. He put a dormer in the attic over the kitchen and dining room, so I could have a bedroom of my own. He converted the back porch to a utility room with a washer, drier, and freezer.

We went from a school just off Hamilton Lake, to a little country school literally in the corner of a cow pasture. I remember one baseball game in the corner of the cow pasture had to be called when the bull and a herd of cows came up to drink out of the nearby cow tank.

There was a graduating class of three the year we moved there. So after two years, Scott Center consolidated with Fremont. We went to Angola Instead, which meant a neighbor's parents drove us in as Father was supporting us and the farm with other jobs.Which meant getting used to new bunch of kids.

After I graduated in 1959, Father and I went job-hunting together. I put in a hitch in the Air Force, then went to nearby Tri-State College. My career as an electrical engineer lasted 49 weeks. Held down a number of local jobs including Assistant Steuben County Surveyor. Worked mainly as a tech writer, doing mainly computer manuals. But worsening arthritis left me working as a nightwatchman. Over 12 years ago, I got on Social Security Disability.

My sister and I and nine cats live in the same house the two of us moved to in 1953. We have let three stray cats move in the last 16 years. One presented us with six kittens. The most recent one, after she found we were better providers, bought down four kittens from our next door neighbors.

Titles

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