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My Early Life - Page 3
by Bess King

The summer was Mother's busiest time, as of course it was for Dad. They had a huge garden - a lovely spot for a garden - but it was far from the house. The water for it came from a spring. Someone had made a small cistern where the water collected from which it flowed down to the garden in a ditch. To go to the garden we went down through the pig pasture - it probably wasn't really so far as it seemed to me. They let the water run through ditches down between the rows, so fairly often someone had to go there to change it to other rows. And they were constantly weeding, sometimes in the mornings and often in the evenings too, after all the other work was done. It was a never ending job.

I remember being in the garden when Aunt Nora and her three children were with us. Aunt Nora tried to find a place in the grass to lay the baby down and just as she started to put her down she discovered a rattle snake curled up right there. That created a great deal of excitement as you can imagine, but Mother managed to kill the snake with her hoe and they hung it over the fence were we kids watched it wriggling for a long time. Apparently snakes can keep moving after they are dead, as a chicken does. The story was that they can't really die until sundown.

Mother was busy all summer canning all the vegetables and fruit on the wood stove in very hot weather. We stored many vegetables and some fruit in the root cellar - apples, potatoes, carrots, onions, and turnips. We had an old orchard beyond the garden, where we grew many kinds of fruit. We didn't spay in those days so it was inclined to be wormy. Mother sometimes had help in the summer, but not always, usually just for the threshing when there might be 12 to 15 men for a few days. As I remember the harvesting - usually the help was neighbors - they traded work for this kind of thing.

School:

Mother did not start Nina to school when she was six - she taught her at home, so she wouldn't have to go alone. She couldn't keep my nose out of the lessons, so she taught us both and we started school in the second grade when I was 6 and Nina 7 1/2. Dad bought a gentle old mare named Sally who carried us patiently and slowly to school for many years. We didn't really have to go alone; we had a friend, Marda Mayer, who lived farther away and who rode past our house and usually with us the rest of the way. School was in Spray, 2 1/2 miles from our home. Also we had neighbors 1/2 mile or so closer to school - the Steagall family; their children were younger that we were but eventually four of them went to school with us. They had to walk, but often we would all go along together. Our parents sometimes let us walk in the spring when the weather was nice. Sometimes in the winter, Dad or our hired man would take us to school in the buggy or sled, but not often. We had warm clothing, but not rain coats, and I can remember getting very wet on rainy days.

I was sick a lot, missing school quite frequently in the winter. Nina was tougher, but when she did get sick she was sicker - I remember her having pneumonia at least once. Fortunately, the time she had it when we lived on the ranch there was a Doctor practicing in Spray and he took care of her. Mostly we didn't have a Doctor available at all, except in Fossil or Condon.

We enjoyed playing with the Steagall children. They were always very nice to us and usually had a baby they would let us play with. They were all very nice children. We felt very put upon because we didn't have a baby - so many others did! The Steagalls eventually had eight children.

Our school was in Spray, which was a very small town situated on the bank of the John Day River. It was a two room school - four grades to a room. Our first teacher, Hazel Hampton, was a beautiful, very sweet young lady - I think she must have been a very good teacher. I adored her, needless to say and I kept in touch with her for many years after we had both left the Spray area.

Our school certainly wouldn't have been considered very good by today's standards. Our library was a very short shelf of books in the upper grade room. There was a one volume encyclopedia, a dictionary and surely a book on archaeology (that is where I first heard of Eohiippus), but I can't imagine where it might have come from. In 6th and 7th grades our teacher was the principal, Mr. Murphy. I'm sure he was an excellent teacher - he did a great deal with a minimum of equipment. I have always remembered him fondly.

Of course the best part of school was recess. The building was on a small hill, and across a small flat space - our playground - was a much higher and steeper hill. Marvelous sledding on both hills, but for the older children, tobogganing down the higher hill was a truly great thrill. We also had an outside basketball court, and of course we played baseball.