July 10, 2022 The Summer I Remember Best/ Summer Memories

 

Summer Memories

By: Carrie Keiser

The summerI remember best? Well I have a couple of them them and they both revolve around trucking with dad.

The summer of 1984 we (Ryanne, Clancy, Megan, mom, dad and I) crammed into the Green cabover Kenworth with no A/C and set off on an adventure with Mom and Dad. Ya see dad was getting a load that would take us close to some church history sites and mom thought it would be something that we  should see and experience.  I remember Clancy and Ryanne were spending the night at the Jones and we had to call and have them come back home so we could get up early and leave.  I remember it being warm in the truck, but since we didn’t have air conditioning at home not really that bad. The space isn’t ideal for 6 people but we got creative with our sleeping arrangements. One night we stayed at a really big rest area and we chased fireflies and slept on the load.  Other nights we slept in various places: some in the sleeper, some in the seats and on the dog house. I also remember mom making up games to keep us entertained and quiet maybe. She would give us an M&M and the goal was to see who could make it last the longest. It a long drive in a semi from western MT to Nauvoo, Illinois. Somehow we all survived. We spent a day being tourist after dad dropped off his load. We saw all the things, got horseshoe nail rings, watch them make and do things like they did back in the day. We got a fresh brick that wasn’t quite cured and I was so excited to be able to carry it, I was the oldest after all and it should be my job! Well as kids are kids, I was running and tripped, dropping that brick on the corner. We had the most unique brick to come from Nauvoo. Dad had scratched the date into the back of it. As luck would have it, we arrived in Nauvoo at the right time and were able to experience the pageant, I don’t remember much about it though, singing and storytelling. That night we had planned to sleep on the ground under the trailer like it was a huge tent, but in Illinois, they have some terrible bugs called sand fleas and they attacked us! Dad’s hands were all swollen and I think Megan suffered many bites as well. We ended up inside the cab.  While in the area we went to Carthage Jail, I remember them telling the story of the martyrdom and seeing the bullet hole and the stains. We also attended church in Nauvoo. At the time there was an empty space where the temple had been and we walked/ran though the temple grounds.

On that same trip we went to Lake Michigan and camped. There was a Canadian goose that followed us around. We went swimming in the lake and Ryanne lost a brand-new tennis shoe (well we are sure some little kid stole it) and she ended up having to wear mom’s slippers I think.  

I believe that it was also on this trip that dad had to deliver something on a base and us kids were told to stay inside the sleeper area and be very quiet.  They zipped it shut and we did our best to be nice to each other and as silent as 4 children can be!

My other memorable summer was the year I went trucking with dad just me.  We experienced the most awesome summer storm ever.  It rained in torrents and the light show was unforgettable!  We were cruising down the interstate and it was lightening and the thunder was cracking, when all of the sudden, the lightening struck the lane near us.  That was the scariest thing, I think for both of us! Dad pulled off at the next truck stop we found and we braved the torrential rain and the huge puddles to get indoors.

We had to deliver our load in Ohio somewhere, but because of the rain, we had to wait a few days. I will forever associate Ohio with rain. I remember we left the trailer maybe at the place it was to be unloaded and we stayed in a campground in the Semi. Dad taught me how to play backgammon and we played many games. I also remember ordering BLT’s at like everyplace we ate and keeping my straws from chocolate shakes for some reason.  

A Memorable Summer

Flynn Family Story Slingers

10 July 2022

Summers of my childhood along the windy Rocky Mountain Front seem to blend together because the memories were a series of annual events. 

First there was the end of school, which came in mid-May back in those days of my two-room elementary school.  My grandmother was the hot-lunch program cook at the school and so she was nominally in charge of the big community potluck picnic that celebrated the last day of school and she splurged the lunch budget with buying a few big watermelons, probably some kind of meat dish and two-gallon cartons of several flavors of ice cream.  Families attending also brought all kinds of summery salads, and casseroles and pies and cakes.  And even folks too-old-for-kids-at-home would come join in, happy for an afternoon’s respite from irrigating and plowing and other what-not drudgery.  The day was spiced up with playing softball amongst the farmers and kids while the ladies fussed and gossiped, all under the shade of the tall cottonwoods and elms in amongst the tall hedges of blooming lilacs and caragantas.  We kids were in frenzy to get lots of use out of the school playground equipment—tall aluminum slide, whirling merry-go-round, monkey bars (shaped somewhat like a Gemini-rocket skeleton), broad-bottomed swings and teeter-totter—because it would be three months until we got to play on them again.  

Second, was weekly trips to my grandparents, where my mother used Grandma’s washing machine (we never had enough water at our house to use a washing machine) and we boys would get haircuts from Grandpa and in turn would mow his lawn.  We spent lots of time at my mother’s parents during the summer and there was always lots to do with their chickens, calves, pigs, ducks, sheep, milk cows, cats, herd dogs and, especially for my sisters, the horses.  They were horse-crazy girls and we boys had fun with them also, but never went much out of our way to ride the way the crazy horse girls did.  And if there were other cousins around we would have even more fun with all the activity, including puddle-ducking in the irrigation canals and ditches that ran through the farm.  There was also some work involved, such as hanging up the freshly laundered clothes on the clothes lines, weeding the garden, picking strawberries, hauling around hay or straw, feeding calves and pigs, bringing jars of canned fruit to Grandma’s kitchen from the big root cellar that was on the other side of their gravel driveway. 

Third, exploring the world around us.  We had hours and miles to roam around, hiking across grain and hay fields, along the canals and irrigation and drainage ditch banks that criss-crossed our section of the Greenfields Irrigation District.  The ditch banks were the most likely places to have volunteer trees growing along them, which we could climb around or spot birds and bird nests, pretending that the trees were anything from pirate ships to Tarzan’s swinging jungle.   A few fish might be in the deeper waters, but never any big enough to use a hook to catch.  But we often figured out ways to catch little frogs or minnows or hair snakes.  Before we had ducks of our own, we caught plenty of black-and-orange-and-yellow garter snakes which tolerated being handled.  But ducks love to eat those snakes, fighting over them like two kids with a single spaghetti noodle—so snakes became scarce— which was fine with my Mom, who hated to hear that another snake got loose in her house!  And summer was when we could really ride our bikes!

Fourth, the nearly weekly gatherings we would have for picnics at one grandparents’ house or the other.  The Fourth of July was usually at the Holmquist because Grandma H. made a big deal out of it, when timing in the season would be right for the men to take a break from haying and irrigating for the festivities—firecrackers and food, including watermelon and beer.  Grandma would usually invite any relatives who would show up and she relished getting to gossip while setting up the tables under her great tall cottonwoods and then cleaning up.  My Grandma Vance liked eating outdoors, so we often had weekend get-togethers at her house for noon-time picnics, trying to dodge the flying cottonwood fluff that seemed to go on there all summer over her lawn, Christmas snow-Fall in July.  Many cousins were usually part of these gatherings and so we were whooping, throwing balls over the roof of the house and water-fighting, which Grandma usually started.

One summer, a significant event happened which changed our world and our view of the world.  I was twelve and nearly at the end of my grade-school days when Neil Armstrong was the first man to step onto the moon.  The decade-long dream of Americans had finally reached its zenith after so many launches and space-walks and giddy anticipation.  I remember coming into the house all sweaty and shirtless from the hot sun outside and squinting with pride and excitement at the fuzzy black-and-white television to witness the greatest human achievement…hearing that one giant leap for mankind was taking place at that very moment, hundreds of thousands of miles away.  That night we all strained to see if we could spot the red, white and blue flag that was posted there—and has been there ever since the 20th of July, 1969.  

                                    

Story Slingers

July10, 2022

Myrna Flynn

THE SUMMER OF 1952

That summer was the first summer that I remember us getting into the car and going on a journey out of Washington State. I think it may have actually been my dad who wanted ti g to California.

My brother, Jim, was in the Air Force and was stationed at an air base in Sacramento. We were on our way to go see him. My Uncle Roy went with us to do most of the driving with your Uncle Ed as the relief driver. Also, my friend, Margaret Butte, came with me.

Our trip down was on Highway 101 which goes along the ocean. It was the first time I had ever seen the ocean. We stopped at a wide spot on the road where there was a nice beach and spent a couple of hours. wading in the water, watching the waves come in and looking for shells. I found a clam shell that was perfect and kept it.

As we were driving along, I realized that I had left my new loafers where we parked. Since we had not gone far, Uncle Roy turned back. We could not find them. It made me very sad that I had forgotten them. (I still remember what they looked like.)

A few hours on the road, we started to smell an awful odor. It was the clam that I had picked up. I, not knowing anything about shells and ocean creatures, found out that it was a mistake to keep a shell with the clam still in it!

We made some other stops along the way, one was to wander the Redwoods. They are huge, I think we picked some mistletoe and since my dad had been a lumber jack and was an expert at sawing down trees, I just got to wondering how he would have coped with sawing down one of those. But the redwoods are not the biggest trees we were going to see.

When we got to the air base, all we had to do to get in to visit an airman was show a driver's license and say who we came to see. I think after we visited, that Jim was able to go to dinner with us.

We spent that day and night in Sacramento and then on with our journey. We went from there to where the Sequoia trees are. I do not remember us driving through the trunk of the tree, but I do remember Ed climbing up a ways on one. There was a stump that was the size of a small dance floor. If I recall, it was 20 foot in diameter.

Our trip back homes on the highway up the middle of California. We stopped in Klamath Falls, Oregon, to visit relatives. One cousin, Leo, and his family had come to see us a few months before and Margaret had a crush on him. He said to Ed, and I hope Margaret did not hear him, "Why did you bring her with you?"

Something happened while we were at that house. Somehow, Margaret and I were alone there. Tow of Leo's friends burst in and scared us. They wanted to know where Leo was and why we were there. They looked around a little and then left. We were very happy when they were gone.

The rest of the trip was mostly enjoying the pretty countryside and especially , Multnomah Falls. (I have since found out that OR has 238 waterfalls.I have seen a few more because we have taken the falls loop road that is close to Multnomah.)

Finally, that is my remembered summer, 1952.

Story Slingers Prompt

The Most Memorable Summer

July 8, 2022

Daren Flynn

A SUMMER TO REMEMBER

In many ways it was ordinary, no different from past summers, a summer during which I was employed by Clarence Cole, a local farmer for whom I had worked before.

Some of the things I remember doing that year which were no different from what I had done each summer I had worked on the Cole farm included putting up hay.This was not done in the same way most farmers do it today. For one thing, it was a dry land farm and it was not alfalfa hay. We harvested barley and oats for hay.

We did not have a swather nor did we use a hay rake. I drove a small John Deere crawler tractor pulling a hay binder which worked by way of the PTO connection of my tractor. Rather than bales, the binder produced bundles which later (and it was my job) had to be shocked. This was done by standing several bundles upright against each other forming a TeePee shape for curing. Those shocking days, no pun intended, were always visited by intense heat of the sun with no clouds to ease it. 

Once the shocks of hay were cured, with a pitchfork in hand, it was my duty to pitch the bundles onto the hay wagon as it was pulled along the rows of shocks. The loaded wagon was then pulled to the barn where, again with my pitchfork, it was my privilege to unload the wagon, bundle by bundle into the hay chopper which blew the chopped hay into the hayloft. And that is the way we did hay on the Cole farm.

Back in the days of my youth, there was a Green Giant Pea Cannery in Pomerpoy, Washington where I lived and during summers, prior to my hooking up with Clarence, I worked in pea harvest for the company: first as a swather operator and then as a tractor operator pulling a loader picking up peas and vines from the wind rows and loading trucks on the go. The vines were then transported to stationary viner for separation of the peas from the vines.

Clarence planted a field or two of peas each year. The Green Giant company set up their stationary viner at the silage pit on the Cole farm. My twelve hours per night job at the silage pit consisted of spreading the vines fairly evenly with the before mentioned John Deere tractor fitted with a forklift bucket, then pack them down with a D6 Caterpillar tractor. When the peas were all harvested we had a pit full of silage for winter feeding.

I spent many hours and many days in the seat of the D6 Cat doing a variety of field work. There was plowing, harrowing, weeding and, of course, wheat harvest. Unlike the tractors of today which are equipped with air conditioned cabs, radios and even GPS, that D6 had no cab and no conveniences. I was out in the open air subject to dust so thick that goggles were necessary and then sometimes it was impossible to see past the radiator cap. Then during wheat harvest, in addition to the dust, there was always chaff blowing and swirling around my face and getting under my collar, to say nothing about the ragweed which caused a very itchy rash.

Driving the Cat at harvest was challenging. I was pulling a big heavy John Deere 36 combined on some of the steepest farm land in Garfield County. On some of the hillsides the Cat was actually more or less sideways and clawing uphill in order to keep the combine header in the grain because the weight of the gargantuan JD36 was pulling the D6 rear end down the hill. I was not the only one struggling at that point in time. Clarence who was operating the combine had his hands more than full. That old machine did not have automatic leveling, so Clarence did his best to keep the old 36 level, or as close as was possible on those hillsides, along with keeping the header out of the dirt and still cutting the wheat at the proper height.

When the harvest was complete we were tired to the bone, but so happy that we threw our hats on the header and watched them go through the innards of that faithful old John Deere with our fists in the air.

All of those experiences I have described about that summer were pretty much the same as the previous few summers.

But this particular summer was not "the same ol' same ol'" No! Notwithstanding the before mentioned memories, the summer of 1958 stands alone. Not only did I, in what little spare time I had, manage to have a try-out with the lewiston Broncs baseball team, but was told by the manager that I was equally as good as the pitchers who had been sent up from Phoenix, but since I had already paid for a radio course at Radio Operational Engineering School in Burbank, California, I chose to go to school rather than try baseball.

So that was different and memorable, but it was not what made that summer the best.

Myrna and I were married on August 23, 1958 in the Lutheran Church in Cheney, Washington. We had both worked that summer and saved as much as we could to pay for our honeymoon trip to Burbank where that most memorable summer ended on September 22, 1958.