Not Much Food, A Sad Memory

By Clifford G. Oshel

Special to the Standard-Examiner

As I can recall, it was in the year of 1934. My father was an engineer on the railroad and had an accident. He was seriously injured, with the loss of the use of his left arm and left leg. My folks were heavy in debt at the time, as most folks were then. The railroad gave him $3,000 for his 29 years and no job.

There were eight of us children, ranging from 4 to 21 years of age. I was 15 at the time. We lived in town at this time, in Iowa. It was beginning to go into the late fall of the year.

My father didn’t know what to do then and asked each of us what we thought. I said, “Why not move on a farm and us boys could do the work?”

So that is what we did, not knowing anything about farming.
We never had electricity or inside plumbing and it was quite a change in our lives.

 Well, Christmas time came around and we barely had enough to eat and not much to look forward to for Christmas.

I decided we should have some sort of Christmas so I went out into the woods and found an evergreen tree and cut it down.

I took it home and we decorated it the best we could. Then I took my gun out and shot some rabbits.

My brother and I walked three miles to town over the snowdrifts to trade some cream for groceries, as the snow was too deep to get through any other way.

I can remember my mother as she slaved over the old wood cook stove. We seemed to be happier then and had only each other.

 It turned out to be a very happy Christmas after all. I shall never forget that day of my life. That was the last time we were all together.

Reprinted by permission

©Copyright 2005 Oshel.Com
All Rights Reserved
Privacy Notice
Comments to webmaster@oshel.com
Last Revised 09/18/2005