Can't you just hear the swing creaking and the screen door slamming in this wonderful painting by Duane Bryers? A trip over to the farm this week brought back that familiar "Home Sweet Home" feeling. We were there to mow and spray weeds, a work day so there was no time for porch sitting or moon gazing but I have those memories tucked away and they will never fade!
Our Grandson went with us and mowed the yard, hard work for a 12 year old! Gavin has inherited a love of the land, not sure how that happens when you've been a city kid all your life! He begs to go with us and wants to help out with the work involved. I wonder if farm life may be in his future. It suited my Grandparents, they chose that lifestyle while Grandpa's brothers and sisters moved to California during those Depression years for better wages.
I've heard my Mother time and again tell about when her parents bought a wheat thresher to help them with the harvest. They took great pride in this piece of machinery that made their lives so much easier.
Until they were able to buy the thresher, hay rakes were used to harvest the wheat.... can you imagine?
This instruction manual was in the top of one of the closets, it didn't take me long to locate the pictures of the delivery day of this much anticipated machine!
This had to be either the banker or the salesman... a suit and farm work don't exactly go together! Grandpa is in the background.
Here Grandma and her cousin show how easy it is to operate this big rig!
Today's farmers face many challenges, costs for producing crops are astronomical with the price of corn and gasoline, not to mention farm equipment. When I look at these pictures, I am in awe of the strength my Grandparents must have had to run their farm. Really it was just the two of them, and somehow they managed. We've come a long way, American farmers feed the world. Quite an accomplishment!
