IMAGES OF THE PAST
1975-1979

    We are but an image of our past, plus the addition of our own dreams like the leaves on the family tree, hoping to give a place in the universe with other leaves on the tree, catching the sunlight and blessings of the raing, giving stength in unity against the storms of life and fortitude from the roots of heritage.
    We are but one family, like one tree in the midst of a grove of others.  The grove made ups of family trees of our closest friends and adquaintances of whom we will try to tell you of as stories remembered as told to us and of memories held dear of the lifestyle of generations past.
    Our roots go deep and far, from across the atlantic to soils fo Luxembourg, France, and Holland.  Seeing the colored leaves of Autumn reminds one of the many-colored flags one can recall as those of countries from whence our fore-fathers came.
    Stories were repeated from generation to generation of our families whose occupations were mostly farming.  During thewinter months around the hearths and heating stoves, parents gathered; passing on the past which gave one a sense of pride from the accomplishements they related to us.
    A soldier of the Napoleonic Wars named Rennier travelled to Luxemburg from his homeland, France, and settled down there after marrying a Luxemburg girl.  He must have had many interesting tales to tell his family.  From this family came young families who went to the New World to rich farm lands in the vicinity of Columbus, Ohio.  Many farm people settled here and later moved west to the prairies of Illinois.  There they started their Catholic communities.  Many names such as Zuber, Rennier, Zqilling and Kraus are numerous in the Columbus telephoned directory yet today.
    An interesting story about our maternal great grandparents is worth telling.
    This is about Adolph Rudolphi, a student of theology with the Jesuit Fathers.  After eight years of studies, he was sent to America to finish his tudies uner the Jesuit misssionaries and to help teach the Indians about God.  But, on the ship crossing the Atlantic, he met a petite red-headed maiden, Anne Drewes, who was coming to America with her parents.  Adolph decided after meeting her that he would rather raise his own brood to teach them about God.  He did a pretty good job, too, for most all on that family tree are good Christians.
    Mother used to talk about her grandfather with such pride.  He was a huge man - tall in the eyes of his fellow men as well as tall in structure.  Whe the German community was setteled in what is now calle Wendelin, he was a leader in the community because of his knoledge and learning he acquired in Europe.  He helped build the first church and school there.  He would see to it that a prist from the Vincennes mission would come once a month to perform the marriages and baptisms.  He acted as doctor and counselor for the families who came to settle there.  The depth of his training was handed down to my grandmother and to Mother.  Even though she lived four miles from Wendelin, she used to hitch up a wheezing old nag and go to the Catholic schoool through all kinds of roads and weather, or walk through woods and over frozed creeks to attend that school even though there was a much closer public school nearby.  This endurance and faith styed with her until the deay she left us for her reward.
    The only time I ever heard her talk against the church was when she spoke of the death of her sister, Bertha.  the family all came down with typhoid fever and the nursing nuns informed the family that no food should be given to those who were stricken with the disease.  She always believed that the sister she loved so dearly died from starvation.  However, I think this was her outlet; in order to cope with grief she had to lash out at something she did not understand.
    Anto Klueg, another maternal grandfaterh, had a very sad and unusual childhood.  His mother came from Holland, but I am not sure where his father's birthplace was.  Anto grew up in Evansville, Indiana.  When he was very young, both of his parents died, leaving several boys and girls.  The youngsters were all lined up for the uncles and aunts to choose which ones they wished to care for.  Anto was taken by a childless couple who expected more from the boy than he could give for his "keep,"  When their expectations were not met, he received sever beatings. He loved people even at that early age, and one evening, he became engrossed in a neighborhood marble game as most boys of fourteen would, forgetting the time.  Then the "Angelus" bells peeled out from the tower of the nearby church, remining him of the hour.  Knowing this meant another whipping, he decided to run away from home. 
    From that day on, he was on his own.  He worked westward toward Illinois, mostly working as a stable boy.  This is how he came to Wendelin, where he worked for Adolph Rudolphi.  Here he met my grandmother Anne.  kAfter a time, they were married and settled down to raising a family and farming.  My mother was the third child of seven children.
    My father, Aloysius C. Rennier, was the twelfth child in his family.  His fathe adn mother, Jacob and Gertrude (Kraus) Rennier were one of the first families in their community.  Dad's grandfathers, John Yager and John Kraus, were of the original families, quite wealth and owners of large tracts of land.  My great, great uncle, Valentine Kraus and his wife, Matilda, gave the land to Jacob and Gertrude and helped build the first Catholic church in the "Bend."  Grandfather Jacob Rennier came from the community of Stringtown, a German settlement south of the Bend.  He met my grandmother at a "barn raising."  Grandfather Jacob was the oldest of a large family and we have many cousins still living in Stringtown.  Gertrude, my grandmother, was the oldest of the Kraus family and was taken to be raised by Valentine and Matilda Kraus wo were childless.  They lived in a log cabin near the site of the house where I grew up.  The Kraus's helped build the ten room brick house for Jacob and Gergrude, baking every brick in kilns on the clay hill west of the house near the North Fork river.  The timber came from the woods nearby.  There were apricot, peach, apple and pear orchards surrounding the home along with groves of pecan, walnut and butternut trees.  The fruit was dried, canned and stored in the ice block house.  During the winter, the ice was chopped and brought to the ice house from the river. 
    When each of Jacob and Gergrude Rennier's children married, they were given ninety acres and a house was built for them by every one working together.  Since Dad was was the youngest, he got the homestead and we three girls had lots of room to roam.

HISTORY OF THE 'DARK BEND'

    About 1859, German settlers settled in the Dark Bend, so named for the land in the bend of the Embarras (Am-braw) river.  It was called dark for the density of woodlands, and it was a hidaway for horse theieves and refugees from the law for many years.  No wonder many of the early German settlers' barns were burned and livestock stolen.  Despite all this, they stayed, and others came until finally the dark days of the "Dark Ben" were ended.  The lands were cleare of their dense forests and the swamp lands drained until there were mail boxes beside the roadways showing many German names of those wo civilized the locality that once knew a different way of life.  Our descendents were a part of this.
    The river, Embarras, was so named by the French, who pronounced it Em-bar-rah, for the river's sluggishness and the countless bends filled with driftwood and snags which made navigation difficult enough to embarrass the best of boatmen.  It still maeanders hither and yon across Jasper County, Illinois and on through Lawrence County to join the Wabash River.  Before the coming of railroads, it was declared a navigable stream with numerous flatboats to carry products and lumber down the river from the banks of Charleston, Illinois and on south.

 

MY FATHER

My father was a wonderful man
Loved his neighbor and tilled the land
Quick to smile and tell a joke
A happy man, just simple folk.

He never traveled or went much to school
Feared his Lord, lived the Golden Rule
Provided well, faithful to "kin"
Worked too hard to think of sin.

Willing always to lend a hand
No one a stranger, everyone a friend
Worked the soil with mules and plow
Lived every day as best he knew how.

He loved animals, especially dogs
Raised cows, horses, chickens and hogs
Knew about plants, flowers and weeds
watched for signs to plant the seeds.

In his home, he was the king
Taught us to laugh and how to sing
He never failed to say his prayers
An honest man, without any "airs."

 

BOYHOOD OF MY FATHER    

    Remembering the stories he told us brings a bit of humor to the spirit.  Being the youngest of eight living children, one can imagine the happenings in that big rambling brick house.  The pranks, five "strapping" boys and three giggling girls must have dreamed up.  As most big families do, they paired off with favorites of certain older brothers or sisters.  John, being the apple of his father's eye, was the oldest and boss of the brood.  Peter was full of mischief, getting his younger brothers, George and Aloysius (Lees), into fights; climbing down the porch posts from the upstaris bedroom.  After evening family prayers, he would go out this way to be with the neighborhood boys, much to his father's disgust.  Grandfather was purely puritanic in his thinking.  To have fun was a vice of the devil.  Work and prayer was all that live should be lived for.  When he proceeded to dictate his ways, he had problems with his sons.  Jacob, Jr., the third son, was a dramer and often disappointed his father for not working as hard as grandfather thought he should.  One time, when he did not do as much as was expected, grandfather proceeded to usse his "hickory stick" and the family dog bit grandfather in the seat of his pants.  The boys also would have numerous fights in the barns, throwing "cow pies" at each other.
    Dad was to tell us of the family weddings of the older girls,  Mary, Matilda, and Margaret.  Thre were long tables of food, jugs of wine and dancing all night.  At his sister Mary's wedding, his brother, George, cousin "Joker" Blank and he went to sleep in the bottom of the big walnut wardrobe.  They couldn't find room on any of the beds, for they were filled with coats and youngsters and babies of the guests.
    Grandmother Rennier had a truck-patch and sold fruits and vegetables in the nearby town of Ste. Marie.  Dad also used to sell milk there, carrying it in cans and dipping it out into pails at the doors of his customers.
    They wore coarse home-made trousers and shirts whcih got mighty hot while hoeing corn by hand.  In a closet at home there was grandfather's wedding suit.  It was made of material of wool and had fibers of horse hair woven through it.  The coat was frocklike, and in the back was an inside pocekt where a bottle could be carried.
    A story my father told us was of one of his brothers-in-law who often delayed sending for the doctor when his children were born in order to save the $25.00 delivery fee.  He was real proud of his resourcefulness.  They had a family of eleven.
    Families gathered together for Sunday dinners, gossip, horse-shoes or cards.  Books in the home were rare except for religious ones, and most of those were written in German.  News from the outside world was brought by "hucksters" and peddlers and by word of mouth at towns.  Most of the furniture was hand made and few things were bought except for the organ, cornier dish cupboard and pie safe.  These were ususally shipped by rail fron St. Louis.
    Dad attended school only into the sixth grade and then only for a few months in the winter when there were lesser duties on the farm.  Farming was done with walking implements, pulled by horses and mules.  Nothing was very mechanized in those days. He also attended the Catholic school in Ste. Marie instead of the local public school in the Bend.  He hated school, for he felt inferior to the children in town, and spent a lot of time indulgin in fights.  Grandfather felt schooling was only for the rudiments of the three R's, unless his children wished to be following an inclination to become a priest or nun.  Two of the boys, John and Jacob, did attend a seminary in Jasper, Indiana for awhile.  Grandfather's dream was that they would becomemembers of the cloth, but this dream was not fulfilled.
    Most of Dad's brothers and sisters took to heart that they should "Go forth and fill the earth." My sister and I have sixty firts cousins scattered all over the United States.
    They weretaught that people of different colors, nationalities, or religious beliefs just didn't compare with a German Catholic, and women were made to serve men.  In Know that I must have caused my father much concern as I grew up with my liberal thinking.  But Dand and I became quite close in my adult life.
    Out of my father's family, only one of the boys served overseas during World War I.  Uncle George, who lived across the road from us, spoke often about it.  My father was preparing to go when the Armistice was declared.

 

THOUGHTS OF MOTHER

I often think of Mother
During my busy working day
Especially the months of April & May
Pictures, lovingly, I keep
Deep within my heart
And she appears in my sleep
I see her coming up the hill
With baskets full of eggs
So tired from the farm work
She could harly move her legs
I remember the mornings
As a child on the farm
Of her "fixing" the wood stove
So her family would be warm
And her "priming" the kitchen pump
To draw water for to cook
There were many things about her
I could almost write a book
Clearl, I can see her with Dad
Sitting on the smoke-house swing
The family sigging around
Together we'd chat and sing
She looked forward to Sundays
To go to Mass and to pray
Her rosary was always in her apron
for a decad or two to say
Her eyes were the softest blue
She had a loving slow gring
Will I meet her in another world
And be able to see her again?

 

CHILDHOOD OF MY MOTHER

    Since Mother was more the quiet one of my parents, I cannot recall too many sotries of her childhood; or maybe she was tradtionally taught to be quiet when men were around.  Anymay, while we shelled peas, stemmed strawberries, gooseberries, and sewed, we would get her to tell us of when she was a girl.  They lived on a farm near Wakefield, Illinois.  She was the third child of seven - Edward who died of the flue during his servie in World War I, was the oldest; Bertha, her dearest sister, whod died at the age of fifteen during the typhoid epedemic' Romert, who died at the age of three with pneumonia; Mother, Bernard, Henry and Aurelia.
    She didn't speak too much of her earlier years except for her school days, her grandparents and the names of her uncles and aunts.  I do remember her speaking of her father "Andy" Klueg, being unhappy farming and some of his "get rich" ideas like the one of breeding mules.  Since most people made a joke of this, she was embarrassed at their having jacks and jennies on the farm.  she and her mother must have been very close.  When Aunt Aurelia, her youngest sister, was expected, and grandmother Klueg w3as in her latter forties, Mother, who was almost twenty years old, looked after grandmother.
    Mother reminisced of her girlhood friends-one especially-Pearl (Dorn) Fehrenbacher, who is now my daughter-in-law's (Carol's) grandmother.  When Jim & Carol were married, Mrs. Fehrenbacher said to me, with tears in her eyes, "I wish Maggie were here."
    The Klueg family was one of very vew Catholic in that local, and at that time, much friction between Christian aiths was felt, but she used to sing us some of the religious songs that were sung in other churches of that time, which I enjoyed very much.  Her guilty feelings were always present, though.

 

MY PARENTS' COURTSHIP

    One of my favorite sotries that was told to us, while sitting on the smokehouse porch and my parents in the swing, after chores and supper, was of their courtship.
    Mother and Dad lived twenty miles apart, and, at that time, people who lived that far apart in the rural areas didnn't get to meet each other except at the church picnics givey by different parishes in this part of the state.  It was a rare occasion to go very far from home, for, with the horse and buggy, travelling twenty miles was slow.
    Mother used to reminisce and tell us that seeing our Dad for the first time was truly "love at first sight."  But, as the saying goes, "they were quite smitten," and he started "courting" her; making the long trips between the ben and Wendelin to meet her about once a month.  It would take min four hours each way, and it left very few hours for visiting before he would have to return home again in time to do his morning chors for Sunday Masss after a Saturday night date.  Saturdays wer "courting days."  Farm work gave them very little time for visiting during the week and sSunday was the time to go to churcha and afternoon Benediction and Vespers.  Also, Sunday was for family dinners and visiting with uncles and aunts, grandparents and cousins.
    It was also frowned upon by the community for a young man to go seeking a wife outside of the community or one's parish.  It really was a terrible "sin" to marry outside of one's faith.  Many a despicable prank was tried to discourage such "foolishness."  For instance, Dand
 horse harness was cut several times, and he spent half a night catching his team.  Another time, he was "jumped" by some young fellows on a wooden bridge in a wooded area, and beaten up.  One of the ugliest ricks done to him was the time they removed the grease on the axles and in its place put barnyard fertilize5.
    After travelling a way, this really made the country air polluted, and the weels got dry and stiffand the sprin-wagon wheels were ruined.  After these experiences, my grandfather Klueg asked that Dad stay overnight to return back home the next day.
    After three years of courting, they were married in the church at Wendelin, and Mother came to the Ben.  Her father gave them two cows and a flock of turkeys.  the tradition of a dowry was stille practiced, and it was expected that a young bride should have a hope chest filled with home-made quilts and linens.  The young man was to furnish the house and farm.
    Mothe often said she felt unweclome in the Bend and in Dand's family.  Dad's father had already picked out a local girl for him to marry and the family was very disappointed that a stranger was brought to the house.
    since Dand' mother had dided three years before his marriage, Grandfather Rennier, his brother George, and he lived without the touch of feminine hands in the house.  I guess Mother was heartsick at the first sight of her new home.  By her description, even years later, it must have been a real mess.

 

THE BIRTH OF THEIR FIRST CHILD
Oliva Gertrude Anne Rennier\

    Not being too strong, Mother delivered her first baby, Oliva, prematurely. She weighed only three pounds, with no fingernails or toenails. Babies were born at home with the help of a midwife to assist the doctor.  Often the horse and buggy doctor didn't arrive on time to help.  A neighbor and midwife put Oliva in a blanket-lined bread pan, placed her into the wood burnign stove oven with sacks on both sides of the pan for a makeshift incubator.  The door was kept open and she was watched constantly.  Mother said her tiny handswere so small, her wedding band could be slipped over her hand for a bracelet.
    Oliva grew up to be the largest in stature of all three of Mother's children.
    Oliva passed away at the age of fifty-three.

​

You are now approaching the turn-still
That divides heaven and earth
The one we are gravitate to
From the day of our birth.

We frolicked the meadows together
In the days of our youth
Forgive me for all the times
I was mischievously uncouth.

I was grateful for our kinship
The parents and sister we shared
The memories we gathered yearly
Knowing deep down we all cared.

You ar walking towards a horizon
One that will take you from our sight
But I know you will be happy
For there's a place for you that's right.

So, "so lon," now, dear sister
Someday we will meet again
Until that day in the futre
You will be remembered now and then.

 

THEIR SECOND CHILD
Viola Anne Rennier

    My arrival was thre years after Oliva; another girl, much to my parents' disappointment.  They wished so much for a son.
    Since Oliva definitely looked so much like th Rennier family, I apparently had to look like the Klueg family.  Grandfather Rennier found this quite disappointing.  He cared less whether I cried or not.
    Mother said she feared to leave me to attend the chickens and chores, for, several times, she would return, finding me gasping for breath after having cried so hard, and he'd be playing with my older sister as if I didn't exist.  All through my childhood, he paid very little attention in my direction.  But when grandmother and grandfather Klueg and Aurelia came to live with us, I was happy to feel loved.  Many happy memories still warm my heart to good times with them.

 

THEIR THIRD CHILD
Lucille Bernice Rennier

    It has been told that I often sat on the end of the sidewaly on the hill by the road, hoping for a baby brother or sister, waiting for "ole" Doc Brown to come and bring one.  When I was four, one Sunday October afternoon, we were hustled off into the Model T Ford and take to Uncle Jake and Aunt Belle's to have supper with them.  I do remember this quite well.  The yad a son, Mike, whom I grew up with, and he was like my very own brother.  We gre up roaming the meadow, fishing, gathering mussels in the sand bars to look for a pearl.  Hundreds of mussels were opend, but no pearls.  Mike and I shared many a happy time.
    Anyway, when we were brought home that Sunday evening, I remember that there was a strangeness about the house and we were taken into the west bedroom to our baby sister. 
    So clearly yet, I remember seeing that wrinkled red face, cradled in the arms of my mother, who was in bed and for which I could not understand why.  No way would I believe that she was a sister instead of a brother for days.  It is odd, how distinctly I see the picture of that bedroom with the pitcher of water on the old pump organ on the east wall and Anne Michl, a neighbor, sitting on a chair beside it.  I couldn't understand why she was there and Mother in bed, which was unusual.
    This little sister that I was disappointed in because she wasn't a brother, still is my dearest sister, and the only living member of my immediate family today.  She and I share many happy memories of our childhood.
    
TO LUCILLE

I have a sister of whom I am fond
Remembering love that's cemented a bond
Of friendship dear, that fills my heart
Of me, she shall always be a part.

I loved her much but had to tease
But she was faightul and tried to please
When we were kids, but now we are grown
I hope I've reciprocated with love shown.

She was always the apple of my eye
Sweet, petite, without having to try
We share many memories of our shildhood
Growing up together, they are good.

We reminisce and laugh at times gone by
That bring joyful tears until we cry
And even now with hair that's gray
I love her still, in a special way.

Her family, too, a joy has been
Thy you, God, for my sister and friend.

 

PRE-SCHOOL DAYS

Soon after the birth of my sister Lucille, grandmother and grandfather Klueg and Aunt Arelia came to live with us.  Grandmother Klueg was very ill - a terminal disease.  My parents must have had it hard during the Depression to feed nine people.  I am grateful to have memories of my three grandparents and Aunt Arelia, who grew up to be as a sister to us. i remember sitting by Grandma's bed and playing cards.  The game she called "Joker."  It was always a joy to have her come to the table when she had the strength to do so.
    The night she passed away, I was five.  I remember the sorrow and tears and that it rained that April morning when they carried her casket down the front walk to the wagon, which carried her over the mud roads to the church.
    The deceased was always kept at the home until the burial.  At the wake, people came for miles around to pray the rosary, kneeling near the deceased.  There wer candles buring all night and "watch" was kept.  I remember my Uncle Ben carrying me upstairs to bed and telling me a story, for I was very confused about it all.
    I, Now, think of Mother caring for all those people, a tiny baby, a sick mother, and two small children, with very gew conveniences.
    Dear Grandpa Klueg was such a help.  Most of the men in my father's family definitely believed in "women's work" and "men's work."  But not Grandpa Klueg - hel helpd wash, cook, and entertained us girls.  Helping him "hand-pump" the big wooden wash tub is a special memory.  I do believe I learned to count by the push-pull strokes we took turns doing.  I remember the scoldings from Aunt aurelai when I would get in the way while she carried the "flat-irons" from the stove to the ironing board.
    How Mother managed at this time, I often wonder.  For she, too was not well.  soon after Grandmother's funeral, she had major surgery forty miles away.  W used to go to see her in the open Model T and it was so cold.  The roads were muddy, too.  Ruts used to get so deep we'd play a game walking with one leg in a rut and one out to race to see who could go the fastest without stumbling or falling.
    Another thing I remember before I started to schoo, was the secret Mother and I shared one Easter.  She made dresses for Aurelia, Oliva and me from the prettiest satin. The style was with thos low hip belts.  Mne was green and I was so proud.  We would sew while the girls were at school. My helping consisted of pulling the rod up and down to make the machine go so Mother didn't have to pedal it so soon agter her surgery.  We would put every scrap or tell-tale evidence away.  Tht Easter, Rill and Oliva were so surprised.

 

UNUSUAL VISITORS

`Tramps, gypsies and unusual characters often stopped at our house for a bite or handout.  In return, wood would be chopped or som other chore would be done.  Some of the people would camp in the woods down the road in the Rennier picnic grounds. They used the cook shed to get out of the elements and to keep warm.
    Mother would be so fearful f them, especially the bypsies, for she believed they would try to steal little girls as well as the chickens, pigs and ducks.  But Dad would go to their campfire and sit and talk. One of these characters camped one night with his wife. He was an ex-convict, and when it turned very, very cold that night, Dad asked them to stay at the house. or days, Mother, Aunt Rill, and Grandpa Klueg washed down everything in that room with lye water.  This man would come to visit Dad (or maybe to by Dad's cor liquor) once or twice a year.  One time, while he was visiting, it was hay time. I was about fibe years old.  Always being curious, I was in the barn while the hay was hoisted by a big fork through an opening in the gable into the hay loft by a tow rope pulled by the muls and operated through a pulley. My hand was caught in the pulley, and, when I touched it, it was pretty mangled. Thank od the mules stopped at the first sound of that five year-old girl's scream.  Back to Dad's friend, he had some his potion or salve with him, and that was my medication.  No doctor, no tetanus shot, for one never went to a doctor much in those days.

 

SUNDAYS
    Sundays have always been a day of reflecting - one to take inventory of our weekly lives and the course for the coming week.  First, to accomplish the goals we wish to achieve spiritually in living with others and to plan for the fulfillement ofour worldly lives. This training became drilled in us as children. We would start the day doing only necessary chores, prepare for Mass in the best apparel we owned.  This was the only day in the week shoes were worn in the sumemrtime.  My sisters and I would follow our parents and grandfathers down across the "branch," through the pecan grove and a meadow along the path to the litte white church with a steeple housing the bells 0 St. Valentine's.
    This church was named after great, great uncle Valentine Kraus, who donated the land and the church was built by the people of the community.  It was of simple lines with plain wooden altars, and stain glass windows, whcih filtered the sunlight.  There wre about forty pews, hard and straigh, plain wooden kneeling benches, a tiny choir loft, accessible by a long winding staircase that would have been a fat man's misery.  We learned to sing the Latin at an early age, pronouncing the language very distinctly, but not knowing a word we said.  Every family had their own pew and paid pew rent.  When I go back, I like to sit in the same seat my parents worshiped in for many years.
    Sundays were spent together, walking through the woods, playing cards, horseshoes or visiting relatives.  We learned to know our many cousins, uncles and aunts because of this custon.

 

JANUARY
    January wal always one month out of the year that I think could have been eliminated.  Christmas was over, buthering over and it was so cold with only pot-bellied stoves to keep us warm.  Our long underwear felt good even though they didn't smell too good.  We wore them all week, even to sleep in.  Baths were only taken on Satudray nights in a wash tub behind the stove-freezing in the back, and toasting in the front. There was no bath room or running water.  Hot water only wen we heated it in the brass boiler on the stove or used the water from the reservoirs from the cook stove in the kitchen.
    Roads were impassable, so we rode the wagon or walked.  Eggs had to be gathered several times a day or they would freeze. Warm water water had to be carried to the livestock and chickens. Even though the old barn was drafty, the warmth of the cows felt good to lean against while milking.  That milk, fresh from the cow, had a wonderful smell. The cats would gather around for free samples before thier feedign. Wood had to be pried from the frozen wood pile and split.
    When Dad was afflicted with rheumatism so much, the chores were up to mother and me. Oliva and Aurelai did the inside work.
    Sometimes that split wood backlashed on me. Punishment for not obeying was kneeling on a split piece for fifteen minutes. That is the only time I've been grateful for my fat knees, even though the crease remained there for awhile. Good old goose grease eased the hurt.
    Dad used to make fish nets and make traps to set to make extra money from the furs of mink, fox, muskrat and ground hogs. During the Depression, we would even eat the ground hogs for fresh meat.  Rabbits were plentiful and we had several traps using the carrots we had buried in bins in the basement for bait.  Can you imagine trying to take a frightened, scratching, kicking rabbit out of a small box" We would sack wheat and corn to take to Oblog to be made into flour and corn meal. Corn musch, pancakes with sorghum molasses, eggs, fried potatoes, graby and side meat were always on the menu for breakfast on cold mornings, Dad sometimes had onions, too.  Can't imagine eating a brakfast like that now, but we burned up a lot ofcalories during mornign chores.
    A lantern was a must for chores and it was always checked for readiness the night before.
    All this sounds like all work and no play, but we had our winter fun, too. Children went ice skating, sledding, learned to play cards, checkers and dominoes.  Musical instruments were learned by ear.  We used to have a family band, playing the organ, guitar, "jew's harp," and harmonicas.

 

THE DEPRESSION

the depression period of the early 1930s were very hard times.  Few had any money, and even those who had money couldn't get it as most banks were closed.  but there was always plenty to eat on the farm.  The young folks didn't have any money for movies, hamburgers or soda pop, so they would gather for parties.  They would play parlor games (and some kissing games, too) and cards, checkers and dances.

When the New Deal was established under Franklin D. Roosevelt, farmers were allowed just so many hogs per acre of corn.  My father, being a very conservative man, could not understand the purpose of killing off a perfectly good pig just because his sows gave birth to a bigger litter.  So when the government men came to check our farm, my sister Lucille and I were each given a piglet to hide.  We were in the wine cellar behind those big barrels and told to hold the pigs' snouts shut so as not to make a sound.  We were so scared down there in the dark.

Fourth of July was a great day-one to take off from the chores, hoeing corn and canning.  The neighbors and their families and ours would gather baskets of food and climb into the Model T and go up to Michl's woods for a picnic.  There would be games and racing.  Then we'd enjoy a big dinner of fried chicken, potato salad, green bean salad, fresh tomatoes, cake and ice cream and fresh apricots from our own trees.  Mother always made her famous three-day buns, which were a special treat.  And of course, there were gallons of ice tea, on ice.  We rarely had the pleasure of ice or anything chilled during the summer, for there was no electricity.  We kept the butter and milk in a bucket, dropped by a rope into the deep well down at the south end of the garden.  The butter used to melt all over the dish like a bleeding of dandelions.

After a quite hour or tow after dinner we would watch Dad and the other men log fish in the river, hoping to have pan-fried fish over an open pit in the evening.  A few members of each family would go home to milk the cows and feed the hogs and chickens.  Since I had no brothers, I was the one to help Dad, and I loved the aloneness of being with him on these occasions when he was in such a festive mood.  Usually he was very cautious, but usually on this day, he would let me ride on the front fender, and I would hold onto the radiator cap.  I loved the feel of the wind in my hair and the excitement of "going so fast."  After chores, we would go back for an evening swim in the river.  Have you ever gone swimming in a pair of bib overalls?  That is what we wore.  We wouldn't dare to have shown too much of our anatomy for that was considered sinful.  Even underclothes were camouflaged when they were hung on the wash line.  For shame, someone may see them from the road as they passed by.  Fourth of July was one of the highlights of summer, until the church picnics.

When we were older, we were allowed to stay a weel with Grandpa Klueg and Aunt Aureial after they moved to Newton.  This mean to much to me, for I heard and saw so many things I knwe so little aobut.  Thre were movies to go to, swimming in a pool.  My first Cocacola and breakfast rolls from the store.  Aunt Rill ws so good to us.  Her banana pie was delicious, and I enjoyed her friends that she knew from high school.  When she was sixteen, she and Grandpa moved to Newton.  She kept house and went to school.  she later got her degree from the University of Illinois majoring in Home Economics and is now an Assistant Professor at Penn State University.  As a child, I had such a hero worship of her.