OVER MY SHOULDER

The last few days as I look out over the icy trees, the slick sidewalks and roads, the cold mornings and days, I remember the cold and icy mornings one year when I was in High School that I fed Orville Finnley’s cattle each morning before I went to school. If I remember correctly, Orville had some kind of surgery, and was not able to get out and “feed’ that winter.

Orville had a ‘B’ (I believe it was) John Deere--the one that you cranked with the fly wheel on the side--- it had a hand clutch---if I remember correctly it did have rubber tires. I remember that each morning I would check the oil, and fuel, close ---- or was it open--- the valve on the side---grab the fly wheel---pray that it would start this morning and give it a turn---usually it started. Orville and Maurice never had Children on which to spend their money, he was frugal, and a pretty good farmer, thus he usually had good equipment.

Once the tractor was started, I would drive to the barn or the hay pile depending on which one we were feeding from and load the bales of hay for the cattle. Ever other morning or so, I would go to the kafircorn field and load several bundles of fodder that was still in the field (the kafircorn had been headed earlier in the fall). Sometimes if time permitted, I would have loaded the wagon the morning or evening before.

Once the feed had been loaded, I would take it to the pasture and spread it out for the cattle---cutting the twine on the bundles of fodder, and removing the wire from the bales. Then I would go by the little creek and pond to see if there was any open water for the cattle ----if not, I would cut the ice with a single bit axe.

Most mornings, the process started shortly before sunrise, so as to have enough time to get back home, change clothes and get ready to catch the bus, or to ride to town with Mom, who at that time worked in the Hardware Store in Blue Mound. I am sure that I had on nearly every piece of clothing that I owned, and I was still cold. It seemed that it was always either icy or there was snow on the ground--and maybe both. If I remember correctly, I was paid a big sum of 50 cents per day to do those chores for Orville---and was glad to get the money.

I fed Orville’s cattle for only a couple of months, but remember it because of the cold and snowy weather, and the fact that I ‘got ‘ to run the John Deere---most of the tractors that I had operated were Farmalls.

I had several part time jobs while I was in High School. Earlier I talked about the time that I worked in the lawn mower plant. This was a part time job that I did on Saturdays, days that school was not in session, and for a while in the Summer one Summer. In this job, I made molds in the foundry to cast aluminum parts for the mower, ground mower blades, cleaned castings after they had been poured and assembled parts into mowers.
I worked part time one year during the school year in my Uncle’s hardware store. I would ride the bus to school run the 3 blocks to the hardware store down town, open the store, turn up the fire, sweep the entire store, and wait on any customers that might come by during the time I was there. I had about 30 minutes or so to do all of this before I had to be back to school for the first class of the day.

I recall one Spring that Junior Johnston hired me to plow for him. The most of this work was done on Saturdays, or days that school was not in session. I can still recall that old H-Farmall with a two bottom trail type plow behind it. Junior’s equipment was not always in the best of repair, ---- sometimes it required a lot of baling wire to keep it going.

One 35 acre field that I plowed was full of rocks, so that ever round or two, the plow would catch on a large rock, and trip loose---I would have to back up, rehitch the plow, raise the plow, pass over the rock then trip the plow to drop it back down---the fun part would be that if you were in one of those real rocky areas--that could happen 3 or 4 times in only a few feet. Then there was always those ‘hard pan clay’ areas that regardless how hard you would try, the plow would not stay in the ground.

We hauled the fuel to the field in five gallon buckets, poured it into the fuel tank with a funnel---and manpower. It would surprise you to know how long it would take to plow 35 acres of rocky ground (or any ground) with a slow tractor and a two bottom plow. I think that I was paid $3.00 per day---which was pretty good wages at that time.

One summer, I worked in the Ice House for awhile----’Kelly’ Kelstead was the town Marshall for many years, and owned and operated the Ice House. The Ice House was a small building with thick insulated walls, doors and roof in which he would keep ice. Kelly would go to Pleasanton to the ice plant and pick up a load of ice. The ice that he picked up was in 300 pound blocks, scored into 25 pound sections. We would unload the ice into the Ice House. Kelly would then load some of the ice on the truck and make deliveries for the town and area ice boxes.

It was my job to ‘tend’ the ice house when he was not there, or when he was tending to his other duties. Most of the time I would just sit around in the shade and wait for people to stop and pick up 25 or 50 pounds of ice. During the hot weather, I was always glad when a customer came by as it allowed me to be in the cool Ice House while I was getting the requested ice.

All of these part time jobs, and other part time or short duration jobs about which I will speak later were worked around the chores, haying, etc that I did with Dad on the farm. As we boys got older and into High School, it was not unusual for one or all of us to be doing part time work when we could find it, as the income assisted with money for school and spending money. Each of these little jobs provided me with good experience for future career jobs, and gave me a deep respect for an honest days work, and for those who labor daily.