1953: Driest year on record. State average precipitation: 25.35”
The Prairie south of the house had been plowed up and John and Morris planted corn there in early spring. With no rain to speak of and the hot weather it didn’t even reach the tasseling stage, so it was decided to cut it and shock it for feed for the cattle in the coming winter.
John still had a team of horses, although they had used tractors for what farming they did now. He also still had a horse drawn sled with sickles they had used to cut and shock corn, back before the tractor came into use. |I couldn’t even find a photo of a horse drawn sled anywhere so have inserted this drawing of one.|
As the horse drew the sled down between the rows, John sat on one side of the seat and Morris sat on the other side and they held out their arm to catch the corn as it was cut, stopping to stack it when their arms were full. This was a long and slow process as they shocked the whole 40 acres.
They came in for lunch and in order to make room for Uncle John at the table I would pull that round table out from the corner. I would fix a full meal not a light lunch. Perhaps a roast with potatoes and onion, or even a meat loaf with mashed potatoes and a vegetable. Lettuce for a salad was not available easily at the grocery stores then as it is now in 2011, so I doubt if I would have had a salad, although I liked to bake cakes, so perhaps I had managed to do that, if I had not had too much interference from the two little “helpers”.
Ken and Mike would both have been seated in their high chairs and Uncle John would always say "Hi Buttons,” as that was always his pet names for any of the small children. That way he didn’t have to remember their names!
They had salvaged some of the corn crop for fodder for the Cattle for the coming winter and somehow, working out in that heat, and even with no air conditioning we managed to survive the 110 degree heat.
