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Evelyn Meyer Ibsen

     Evelyn was born on a farm south of Lowden and lived there until 6th grade. When she moved to Clarence, she went to a country school taught by Eleanor Geadlemann. In 1939 she graduated from Clarence High School. She and George met at a dance in Bennett. Ev was visiting her grandmother and there was a dance in the open pavilion almost every Saturday night. They were married in 1941 and lived north of town near the Dayton Cemetery until 1970.

     They did the farming together and worked hard to get the milking and field work done. They did have day help once in a while.

     They had two children. Allen is a small animal veterinarian and Diane, who was a cosmetologist for many years, is now administrative assistant at the North Cedar Middle School in Clarence. They have 4 grandchildren and 6 great-grandchildren.

     When they moved to Clarence in 1970, they started G & E Farm Store. George sold feed and ran the soybean extruder while Evelyn did the bookkeeping and ran the garden shop. Ev was known for her flowers in the shop and at home. They retired in 1998.

     George and Ev loved to go out to eat with friends and dance to big band music. They celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary with a dinner and dance at Highway Gardens. Some of their favorite musicians were Ken Paulsen, Tony Baron, Dave Dighton, Al Pierson, Don Hoy, and many others.

     George was an avid card player and golfer. Ev loved to quilt. She has always been a caretaker of those in need.

     Ev moved to West Wind Villa in 2003. She was able to walk the hall and visit George while he was in the nursing home. George passed away in 2005. Ev remains at West Wind and enjoys her retirement.

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Picture: Above: Helen demonstrates how she gave Rosemary Meyer permanents with the old electrical croquingole/spirl permanent wave machine. The machine used to get hot spots and Helen had to blow cool air on the person’s head to keep them from getting burned.

Helen Thies

     Helen was raised on a farm north of Clarence. As she grew up, her chores were the usual chores for a farm girl - bring in the cows, gather eggs, chase pigs, and feed the chickens. She had few inside chores because her mother and grandmother, who lived with the family, took care of the house. She attended Dayton Valley School near her home. In 1936, she started attending Clarence High School, graduating in 1940. Her main entertainment was playing basketball and going to dances and movies.

     She attended Beauty School in Cedar Rapids, graduating in February of 1941 and then married Henry Thies in November. They lived in Bennett where she opened a beauty shop in their home. Five months later, Henry was inducted in the Army. She wrote what was called a V-Mail letter to him every day. His letters took a month or more to get here and came in bunches. That was a happy day.

     Helen then moved to Clarence to open her beauty shop above what was then the Ford Garage. Emma Jean Sonnemaker and Helen lived in the apartment that was with the beauty shop. At that time with gas rationing limiting the driving, Clarence luckily had a movie theater and much time was spent there for entertainment.

     Three and a half years later, Henry came home from the military. He worked at the Dayton Creamery. In 1946 they bought the building that housed the Clothing Store from Harry Decker who owned the store and building. The upstairs apartment became home and beauty shop. Henry did most of the remodeling work himself. They acquired the Clarence Clothing Company from Mr. Decker in 1949 and operated the business until 1983. The store was then sold to Greta Havel. The building now houses Shirts and Stuff.

     Michael, Kevin, and Robert were all born before another move. In October of 1952 Henry moved a rural school house into town. After remodeling, they moved into the home and beauty shop in 1953. Helen operated her shop until 2001.

     Helen remembers square-dancing and singing in the choir at the Centennial. The boys also had parts as Indians and dancers.

     Helen presently lives at West Wind Villa.

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Frank Fisher, Jr.

     Frank Fisher Jr. (Frankie) grew up on a farm on 165th St. Southwest of Clarence. As a youngster he attended the rural school known as Prairie Flower. This school is now a home west of Wald. He rode a pony to Clarence when he entered High School. During the day the pony was placed in a barn on Piatt street. He didn’t like horses very well and after three days, when his grandmother asked him, “How do you like school?” His answer was “ Fine, except for riding the horse.” His grandmother looked at his Dad and said, “Buy him a car.” So Frankie’s’ parent paid for him to ride the bus until January when he became old enough to secure a driver’s license. Tuition for high school was paid by the county. Many people came to Clarence in 1923 to watch the funeral train of President Warren Harding travel through town and he enjoyed watching Leonard Fictor use a new camera. Fictor also taught him how to develop his own film.

     After graduation in 1933 he helped his Dad on the farm. His father and future father-in-law were the first owners of pull-type combines. He remembers in 1930 when they finished the harvest with the new combine his father taking Frankie and his brother Leo, on the train to Chicago to watch a Cubs game one day followed by a White Sox game the next.

     Frankie farmed from 1936 to 1965. One winter he took a job selling visual aides to rural school teachers. Although she never bought visual aides from him he married a teacher, Evelyn Meier on December 21, 1941. Their first date was to the Wilton Candy Kitchen with a side trip to Fairview Cemetery to his grandparent’s graves. In 1964 he went to work with Grinnell Mutual Insurance. He started working as an adjuster in the crop and hail department and when a position opened in the engineering department it was offered to him by the question “Do you think you can do it?’ Of course he answered yes and he was never sorry he took the challenge. Today, one would need a college education to work in this area. Using 10 company cars, he drove over 40,000 miles a year, accident free, for 10 years, for which he received an award. Frank Fisher, Jr.Frankie and Evelyn are known for their garden expertise. He says the clue is to use fertilizer, water and keep the weeds down. Frankie turned 94 in January, 2009. He has only been hospitalized once, takes no prescription medication but does take of lot vitamins.

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J. Robert (Bob) Bunn

     When Bob first came to Clarence, over 40 years ago, it was a busy little town with three car dealers, two grocery stores, two restaurants, a hardware store, a drug store, a clothing store, and a couple of filling stations. The Clarence Savings Bank was less than four million dollars in deposits and had five employees that had been there a long time. He was so pleased that there were several young farmers (Who are now old men) in the area.

     The bank has now changed to Community State Bank with four locations and about twenty times the amount of deposits. When Bob retired it was about a $54,000,000 bank with twenty-two employees. There are no longer new car dealers in town, no clothing store, no drug store, and no restaurant. So why do we see all these changes? The population has not changed that much. There are a lot of new homes. We have gone through two school changes and are now North Cedar.

     Things have changed at the bank too. They used to file everything by last name and that was most confusing with families with the same name. They did everything with pen and paper and had to balance every night. When the proof machine was purchased, it recorded everything and made daily business much simpler. Then numbers were assigned to every account which meant customers need to use their numbers for every transaction. Customers did not like this at first, but today it is automatic.

     The local farms have grown. Instead of farming 300 acres, a farmer today may farm 3,000 acres which means they need to borrow more money for operating capital.

     Fortunately, they have also deposited much more. The bank has lost most of the their commercial business through the years, and now it is mostly farmers and individuals. The bank attributes their success to treating their customers with a smile and having a real concern for their needs. Customers are in the bank regularly. Bank loan officers understand their needs and know that they will repay their loans when they were due. The employees work hard, but they work as a family. They always have a smile on their faces and they never complain about having to work overtime, for they know the harder they work, the bigger the bank would get.

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Sally Meyer

     Sally (Tacker) Meyer, born in August of 1921 and now 87 fondly recalls the fun she had growing up in Clarence. Sally moved to Clarence in July of 1926 when her parents, Howard and Myrtle Tacker, came here to start a bakery which was located on the vacant lot just west of the present Coop building on Main Street. Highway 30 was still a dirt road.

     The family lived for the first two years above the bakery but later they were able to purchase the home at 315 6th Ave. in Clarence. Sally recalls the neighborhood was full of kids to play with. Their favorite games were May I?, Simon Says, Chalk the Corner, Hopscotch, and Fox and Geese (in the winter). Very few kids had sleds, bikes, or wagons. They were considered luxuries since money was so tight. If they went sledding they would ride scoop shovels or inner tubes down the hill. Many good times were spent at the roller rink located where Terry Ward now lives west of town.

     The teens learned to swim in the Wapsi River at Massillon. Herb Caldwell was an energetic man, and he would load up a bunch of teens and teach them to swim. In the spring they always had to walk the river in a line to find the current and holes so swimming would be safe. Sometimes Harlo Seaton would load up the kids and head for Crystal lake in DeWitt or Lake McBride.

     On Saturday night, the town was full of people with all the stores open for business. The ladies would go to the grocery store to shop and wait for their husbands. The men would go to the barbershop for a shave and haircut, Harry Decker’s Clothing Store to visit, or the tavern. The kids could go to movies for 5 cents at a theater run by Gangsteds which was located on the site of the former antique store previously owned by Sawyers and Pilchers. Young ladies would roam the streets talking to the boys. A bandstand was located between Dircks Law Office and the former Corner Gifts where the community band would play. By dark people were headed home again.

     Memorial Day was observed by walking on the sidewalk to the cemetery north of town carrying mini flags. A wooden platform would be constructed for the speaker. Sometimes it was so hot people would faint. Many church picnics were held at Onion Grove. There would be horse tanks filled full of ice to cool down pop and watermelon. Everyone brought food to share and the afternoon would be spent fishing, playing baseball, or doing 3 legged races. Toward the end of summer every one would look forward to the “Big Day”. There was a carnival on Main Street with rides. Foot races were run by Ed Schluter, and the winners would get money which they would in turn use to ride the Ferris wheel.

     Trips to Cedar Rapids were rare, maybe once or twice a year. When they did go, they would always take in a vaudeville show at the Paramount. She was fascinated by the elevators and nuns when she made to a trip to the big city.

     Sally concluded, “We sure had a lot of fun and it didn’t cost us much.”

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June Rowser

     Do you remember where you were on Dec. 7, 1941? June (Banks) Rowser does. She was preparing the house where she would live with her fiancé, Ralph, “Doc” Rowser after their marriage. Doc was building a breakfast nook when someone popped in to say that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. That event did not impact their lives immediately, so they went ahead with their wedding on Dec. 31 of that year. Doc continued to work at Ruprecht’s Lumber Yard, but in the fall of 1942, he received that dreaded letter from Uncle Sam that began with “Greetings”. About a month later, Doc went off to basic training to become a foot soldier in the Allied Forces. June stayed here in Clarence.

     She worked in Claney’s Grocery Store as a clerk. She remembers that people did not just walk around the store with a shopping cart the way we do now. A shopper would hand a list to June, and she would collect the items. Then she needed to note how many rationing stamps were used on that order. There were red stamps for meat and blue stamps for other items. There were stamps for sugar and coffee too. If someone did not want their stamps, they would give them to the grocer to hand out to needy families.

     Money was tight. The army was not good about getting the pay back home to the wives of the newer soldiers. Doc left in the fall to serve his country, but his wife did not get his pay checks for almost a year. In the meantime, she was evicted from her house because she couldn’t pay the $12.00 rent. She tried unsuccessfully to get help from the Red Cross. The Cedar County Welfare Office advised her to not go on welfare because it would ruin her reputation. So, her friends, Doctor Harold and Billie Bouschlicher took her in for nine months until her husband’s pay checks began to arrive. She then rented a house on 5th Ave. until Doc was discharged.

     People got news about the progress of the war from newspapers and the radio. Those were important sources to everyone. And when they went to the movies, there was usually a newsreel with scenes from the war. Those scenes were months old and had been edited to give a feeling of optimism. June wrote to her husband every day. They were encouraged to keep their letters short, so often she wrote on a postcard which could be mailed for one cent. The letters that Doc sent to her were censored. Sometimes words were blacked out that might give away military information.

     Doc was injured twice in France. After a brief recovery period the first time, he returned to the front, only to be injured again in a mortar barrage. This time, he was sent to several hospitals in Europe before returning to the United States.

     After his discharge, Doc went back to work at Ruprecht’s as businesses were required to rehire an employee who had been in the service. At the age of 47, June decided to go to beauty school. She worked at that profession out of her home at 513 5th Ave. until 2008. She is the mother of twins, Karen and Kieran.

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Don (Whitey) Bixler

     Don Bixler was born to Clarence and Emma Bixler on a farm one mile north of Clarence 85 years ago. He had two brothers, Everett and Jim. “Whitey’ grew up during the depression and after moving to town said there weren’t a lot of jobs for kids. His early recollection of making money was selling popcorn in downtown Clarence at the band shell, but he said “Very few people had the 5 cents extra for a bag of popcorn.”

     “Whitey” graduated from Clarence High School in 1941 and hired out as a farm hand for two years before being drafted for the army in 1943. He was captured at Anzio, Italy in 1944, and spent the rest of the war as a POW working on a farm in Germany.

     Back in Clarence, Don bought out LeRoy Gade’s trucking business in late 1945, and for a short time worked with the Frahm Brothers as a trucking for hire business, mostly taking livestock to Chicago. By 1954, Don took his brother Jim into the business and that became Bixler Brothers Truck Line. That business is still running today, 55 years later, by Reece, Ron and Pam Bixler Stout.

     Whitey didn’t think he was old enough to be in this history book, but having known him for 60 years, “Whitey” is one of Clarence’s Founding Fathers!

Bernice Phillips

     Bernice Phillips came to Clarence in 1938 from Alison, Iowa to work for her brother and sister-in-law, Kermit and Louise Roelf, as a maid. For entertainment, the girls (June Rowser, Helen Thies, Emma Jean and Honora Sonnemaker) would meet at the hotel and drive to Stanwood to the dance on Saturday night.

     Bernice met Lloyd Phillips in 1939, and they were married in 1941. Lloyd and Bernice ran the Phillips Roller Rink just west of Clarence where there was also an archery range. In 1950, Bernice organized and coached the first girls’ softball team in Clarence.

     Bernice said all the shopping was done within the town in the ‘30’s. There were three grocery stores, a meat shop, and Jack Lierick had a movie theater on main street.

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Merlin Hulse

     Merlin was born (in 1923) at the Hulse family farm home (which was common in those days). The family doctor was Doctor Smith.

     The years were lean from 1920-1930’s with the Depression, the Dust Bowl, and three dry years. In 1935 hog prices were so low that President Roosevelt made farmers kill a percentage of pigs.

     Home butchering and canning garden products were done. There was a summer kitchen beside the house for doing the laundry and a smoke house for curing meats. A cistern by the house was used to collect water from the roof that was carried into the house to put in the cook stove reservoir for hot water for the family to use. The washing machine was run by a gas engine. Ladies used a heated curling iron to fix their hair and they heated a flat iron on the cook stove to press their clothes.

     Entertainment was barn dances and cards. In 1933 Philco radio came out with a set that you could use with a car battery.

     The brick school building was built in 1919. The roads were all mud. Buses were single wheeled with bodies made of wood and the seats went to the long way in the bus. Youngsters carried their lunches until the 1930’s.

     In 1932 and 1933, the school board had to terminate the Home economics teacher and also cut the teachers’ salaries due to lack of funds. They needed the money to buy coal for the winter. If a student didn’t address the teacher by “miss…” The student was sent to the Superintendent’s office. Lady teachers were not allowed to be married until in the 1940’s.

     Homes had kerosene or gas lights. Kerosene lanterns were used for outside farming. The telephones were run by a lady running a switch board in town. Someone was there 24 hours a day. One long ring on all the lines meant there was a fire and everyone would go to help.

     Cars had side curtains for protection, a windshield wiper that you worked by hand, and heat came from the manifold through the floor. In 1936 a four door Chevrolet cost $600.00.

     Hospital surgery has gone from ether to modern anesthetics. Large opening surgeries have been replaced by DaVinci methods. Hospital stays went from a week to three days. Flu shots (after World War I), polio vaccine (1960) and recent Shingles vaccines are modern preventative advances.

     Merlin served as a State Senator from 1976-1984. Politics have changed a lot. Little money was spent before the 1940’s. Today it is fund raising, door knocking, TV, and advertising.

     Golly, maybe the “good old days” were really the “good old days” after all.

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George H. Utley, M. D.

     George Utley served as the doctor for not only Clarence, but also other surrounding communities from 1961-1994. The following portion is preprinted from the Sun News, May 22, 1986 in honor of Doctor Utley’s 25th year of practice.

     “In the July 27, 1961 edition of the Clarence Sun, the arrival of the doctor and his wife was a front page news story. The new doctor said he wanted to practice in a town of about 1000 people located near Cedar Rapids. He said he had wanted to be a doctor because I just want the satisfaction of doing something worthwhile.

     Last week, Dr. Utley looked back on 25 years of practice in Clarence. He said it was true he came to Clarence because of its size and location, but more importantly, “I wanted to go someplace where I was really needed.”

     That decision has brought him both satisfaction and frustration. “It is difficult sometimes to live in a community with the people who are your patients…you know too much,” Utley said. And there was a time when he left the Clarence practice for Cedar Rapids because he felt he was “outside the medical community.”

     “I haven’t any question about staying now, “ he says.

     “This is a practice I have built myself,” Utley explains. He speaks of a relationship he has established with his patients. “We can get along. They know what I can do and what I can’t do. I fit this practice because I made it. It’s easier than trying to do something different.”

     Medicine has come a long way in the past 25 years, but not far enough to meet people’s expectations. “They see miracles on TV daily,” he says.

     Miracles aside, Utley says, “The capability of replacing diseased arteries with grafts, or bypassing them, has relieved untold misery.”

     He sees the surgical repair and replacement of diseased joints as another significant advancement. “It used to be if you had arthritis, you just had to put up with it,” he says.

     Utley’s practice has changed too. He has a much larger proportion of older patients now, and not as many children. (End of report)

     In an update for this history book, Dr. Utley spoke about the advancement of technology and the great benefit that it has been to doctors as well as patients. The added information available from an MRI or CAT scan gives doctors more confidence with their diagnosis.

     Dr. Utley stopped delivering babies after the first six or seven years of his practice. Delivering a baby in Cedar Rapids or other city meant long hours on the road and late nights while he waited for the newborn to make its appearance. So when other doctors in the area indicated that they would no longer deliver babies, he decided that it was a good time for him to end that service too.

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     The Clarence Nursing Home was a major project for the community and one that Dr. Utley is proud to have helped to shape. He served on the original committee to plan the facility and was instrumental in establishing the medical staff. He feels that this has been a great asset to Clarence.

     In 1994 Dr. Utley was beginning to feel overwhelmed by the rules and regulations governing the practice of medicine. He felt it was time to retire. Now he spends his time working in the yard, reading, or woodworking. He also stays physically fit by biking. “Doc” and his wife, Kathryn, are enjoying retirement after spending so many years caring for the people of this community and surrounding area.

Alyce Weatherwax

     “When I was in fifth grade, my mom and I went to Tipton to change the spelling of my name from Alice to Alyce.”

     It was exciting to watch the crew pave Highway 30 past my Grandma Kelly’s house (405 Lombard). Grandma even rented a room to a worker.

     When the new brick school was being built (1916) Superintendent (Henry) Irons was in the hole digging, too!

     I remember when Clarence had a movie house and we would get 15 cents to spend…10 cents for the movie and 5 cents for a treat.

     We had four grocery stores in town and party line telephones. Our ring was five short rings.

     My husband, Dick and I were the first couple to be married (11-19-39) in the current Methodist church which was built in 1919. (Note: Many weddings of that time took place in the home of the bride’s parents or the parsonage.) Our honeymoon to Florida for 10 days cost us about $60.00. Our motel cabins were about $2.50 a night.

     We had both gone to business school, but it was during the Depression and jobs were not available. We didn’t know anything about farming, but we learned. Dick’s dad said he would sell his house and buy 120 acres at $125 per acre. Dick’s folks and we shared one car. Gas was 25 cents per gallon. I cleaned houses for 50 cents an hour. I didn’t help much with farming when we used horses, except leading the horse for putting hay up. But I helped a lot when we got a tractor.

     We have a daughter, Sally, and a son, Tom.

     In 1959, I was a co-chairman of the Clarence Centennial Pageant.

     After Dick and I retired in 1980, we enjoyed spending three months in warm Arizona each winter.

     Now, I have the warmth of friends at the Clarence Nursing Home.”

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Paul Chapman, Sr.

     While attending Junior College at Tipton, a local funeral director, Fred Wilson, asked Paul to help him with funerals and drive the hearse. Paul had a high school diploma which qualified him to go to mortuary school. After working at Snell Funeral Home in Clinton and receiving his Iowa license to practice in 1942, Paul was drafted into the Army for three years. He was discharged in December of 1945.

     Paul came to Clarence in February of 1947 when he bought the Beck Funeral Home. In 1951, he had a very interesting death call involving the sheriff’s office and the FBI. While preparing the body of Mr. Chin Joe Kee, seventy-five $100 dollar bills were found sewed into his shirt. It was an anxious ten days until the body was shipped to New York by railway express.

     In the early days, until the 1960’s , visitations and embalming were done in the homes. Sometimes door frames, or windows had to be removed to move in the casket. These days, the government makes things more difficult with paperwork, regulations, and inspections for funeral directors.

     From 1947-1970, Chapman was also in the ambulance business, transporting people to hospitals in Cedar Rapids and Davenport for $25.00

     Paul believes that he is the only funeral director from this area that is a Past President of the Iowa Funeral Directors Association. He was appointed by Governor Robert Ray to serve on the Board of Mortuary Science from 1977-1983.

     Paul’s son, Paul Jr. (“Chip”) has been owner and manager of the funeral home since 1977 when Paul and his wife LaVonne moved on to retirement. Chip’s son, Dan, joined the firm in 1988.

     Our 50th year in Clarence was 1997. The Chapmans are in their third generation of funeral directors and understand the importance of quality service and facilities.

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Edwin Decker, Sr.

     Ed Decker was born in a farmhouse near the Dayton Valley Cemetery northeast of Clarence, in 1917. Four generation of Deckers have farmed the land around Dayton Valley starting with Ed’s grandfather Fred, his father Frank, Ed, and now his son Eddie Jr. who presently lives on the Decker place. Their farm was recognized as a Century Farm in 2002

     The Deckers raised corn, hay, and oats. They also raised hogs and cattle. In the early 30’s , they added soybeans to the crops they raised. All crops were fed to the livestock except the beans. They were a cash crop. A good yield of corn in those days was 70-75 bushels to the acre. Soybeans would yield 30 bushels while oats yielding 50 bushels was considered a good year. Most farms were around 120-160 acres, and the fields were 30-40 acres in size.

     Ed recalls he was 12 when he had his first corn planting experience. Twelve acres needed to be replanted, and he begged his dad to let him try his hand at planting. Two horses pulled a two row planter with check wire. Ed thought the horses probably knew more about it at the time! All the corn was “checked” in those days meaning it could be rowed in either direction. This method of planting allowed the corn to be cultivated in both directions to keep ahead of the weeds since no chemicals were applied as we do today for weed control. The goal was to “Lay the corn by” (Cultivate it four times) by the Fourth of July before it was knee-high.

     When Ed was 17 he remembers plowing 40 acres of pasture with five horses pulling a gang plow which was a 2 bottom plow with 14 inch blades. It took a week to plow the 40 acres and you were considered a poor farmer if you didn’t cover up the cornstalks when plowing. In the mid 30’s they bought their first tractor, a Hart-Parr, which was 2 cylinder, 4 wheel tractor that could pull a 3 bottom plow and disk. However they still continued to farm with horses into the mid 40’s as many of the machines could only be pulled by horses.

     Horses were used to mow and rake the hay. Hay was made twice a year if from clover and three times a year if from alfalfa. Once it was dry, the horse drawn hay wagons would head to the field. There it was pitched by hand onto the wagons. In later years, a hay loader was hooked to the back of the wagon to load the hay. The hay wagons, loaded 10 feet high, were carefully driven to the barn to be unloaded. Ed’s first job in the hay making process was to lead the team of horses that would pull the forkful of hay from the wagon up and into the barn. He remembers making 50 cents a day for this job. Eventually, Ed bough a Case wire baler. Two men would sit on the baler feeding the wire and putting a block of wood between the bales to separate them. Putting the hay into bales helped to conserve space in the barns and made it easier to move the hay when it was ready to feed.

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Picture: Ed’s tractors in the late 1950’s

     When harvesting oats, the binder would be pulled by four horses. The bundles would come off the binder and then be stacked into shocks by hand. Nine bundles would make a shock. The shocks would sit in the field for two weeks to dry. The shocks would be pitched by hand onto a hay rack and brought to the thresher. The “threshing ring” included 10-12 neighboring farms working together exchanging work to complete the task. Al Rogers owned the threshing machine in the neighborhood. The farm wives would work together to feed 20 or more men at noon. The neighborliness and camaraderie among the men helped them to forget the hard and dirty work of threshing. Threshing eventually became a thing of the past when Ed got his first combine in the 50’s.

     Corn picking started in October. The team of horses would pull the wagon along the corn row. The picker would pick two rows at a time by hand, shucking the corn from the stalk and pitching it into the wagon. A good picker could pick 100 bushels a day and was paid 1 ½ cents per bushel. Ed recalled one picker who was especially good. He picked 140 bushels in one day.

     Farmers in those days were up at 5 a.m. Chores came first with the milking and feeding the cows, pigs and horses. Then they would go to the house at 7:30 for a hearty breakfast. The cattle would be fed after breakfast, and then field work would begin. They would work in the field until noon, return to the field after “dinner” and work until 4:30-5:00. Chores would take until 7 p.m. when the work day would end. Wednesday and Saturday nights, the family would go to town to get groceries, haircuts and shaves. Sundays found the family going to church and resting the remainder of the day.

     Field work would start in late March with the planting of oats. Once the ground was fit to work, plowing, disking, and harrowing would take place, followed by corn planting. Beans were planted after the corn. Hopefully the corn was planted by the end of May. In June, corn would be cultivated. If hay was fit to be made, the corn was cultivated in the morning, and hay was made in the afternoon. Threshing took place from the middle of July into August. This would be followed by another session of haymaking. In September, the silo would be filled with silage to provide feed for the cattle and milk cows. Corn was picked in October and, hopefully, completed by Thanksgiving. Hauling manure from the feed floors and cattle sheds to spread on the field for fertilizer took place December through February. Early March was spent repairing machinery and getting it ready for the fields.

     While farming was a lot of hard work and long days, Ed feels it provided a very rewarding and good life. Ed and his wife Irene have been married 69 years. They currently reside in the Clarence Nursing Home.

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Personal Memories and Notes