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SCIA | Mom and Dad are both gone, but, the storied they told were almost heart breaking. Mom and her family lived 2 miles out of "town", about 15 K population, on a small share crop farm. Daily, some one would stop to see if they had any "day work" for food. Some times they would let them split wood or some thing and give them something to eat. And , invariably, they would eat only what they could not carry and carry the rest home for whom ever.
Dad, oldest of eleven, was sent off, at age twelve, to work for an uncle and aunt, about 150 miles from home. He, like many kids in this era, got room and board. Any money went home to feed the rest of the family. Never saw the rest of his family for four years. In my early life ( 60's and early 70's), they had a small chicken farm and custom farmed 2500 acres, (BTO for that era). Dad was always up around 4:30, did chores, and during field work, was gone by 7;00, often not home until 10;30 or 11;00 PM. Us kids did evening chores, Picking up, washing, grading and packaging about 200 dozen a day. Plus feeding, waterer cleaning and any other barn chores.
And, today, if we do not have what they had, when we start, what they had after 60 or 70 years of blood, sweat and tears, we whine like the world is ending. we, truly, are standing on the shoulders of giants. | |
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1920s
