'TWICE TOLD TALES' - 1936

HILEMAN, MCCUTCHAN

Posted By: Nancee(McMurtrey)Seifert (email)
Date: 10/19/2009 at 15:33:55

The Leon Journal-Reporter
Leon, Iowa
October 22, 1986

'TWICE TOLD TALES'
50 Years Ago - 1936

ALVA HILEMAN, 47, a tenant at will, living in the rugged hill land which is
tributary to Grand River, 25 miles northwest of here, has been requested to
move his family to a new location because the school board of the Glenwood
district of Richland township has to pay nearly $150 annually to the Sand
Creek district that the HILEMAN children may attend the Denham school in
Sand Creek district. There is no bridge across Grand River in this part of
the township which prevents the HILEMAN children from attending the school
in their own district. Three of the children, WAUNITA, 13, CLETA, 9, and
EVA, 7, walk two miles through the timber to school. Richland township also
pays tuition to send Paul, 14, to the Grand River high school. He remains
in town during the school week and stays with Mr. HILEMAN who recently
received a job as water carrier on a WPA project, has been certified to a
national youth administration project and will soon begin work as an
assistant janitor at the Grand River school. GERALD quit school in the early
grades. The HILEMAN family located in Richland township three years ago
after DALTON MCCUTCHAN, owner of the land, gave Mr. HILEMAN permission to
temporarily occupy a small clearing just around the bend from a sawmill in
the back country of the woods. Mr. HILEMAN is a one-armed farmer.
Twenty-six years ago his right arm was blown off by a shotgun in a jack
rabbit hunting accident. From rough lumber and corrugated iron, he
constructed a portable two-room house for his family, which he surrounded
with a high wooden lath-like fence. Although the HILEMANs and their ten
children, who range in ages from one to twenty, live in a primitive manner,
they are happy and healthy. Prior to school, Mr. HILEMAN attempted to find
a new place to live but nothing available. Mrs. HILEMAN says, "Even with
the $40 a month salary he receives for his WPA work, it's awfully hard for
us to make it." Mr. HILEMAN early in the spring planted cane. Recently he
made enough sorghum to last during the winter. When the goats are fresh,
the children have goats milk to drink. They have no cattle. He has some
shoats he expects to butcher this winter which will provide a part of the
meat supply. Other meat will include wild game, rabbits, squirrels and
ducks. The older boys hunt with their coon dogs and trap for a small income
Mr. HILEMAN has the best corn in the county. Despite the drought and
grasshoppers in the area this field has escaped both. The fields are
located in the Grand River valley and a quality of seed corn is suspended
from rafters at the back of the house for drying. For plowing he attached a
cultivator to the rear of a knocked-down model T Ford car. His son, LEONARD
20, drives the car while he rode the cultivator, thus plowing was
accomplished. The family gathers in the kitchen of evenings which also
serves as the dining room.