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Memories by Bev Jackson Cotter

One day in the spring of 1985, my mother, who was born in 1902, rode with me to Mason City. We were on Highway 65, preferring the slower pace to that of the interstate and wanting to enjoy the countryside, the big blue sky and the sight of farmers preparing fields for planting. She had been raised on a farm, had brothers who farmed and two of my sisters farmed, so many of our Sunday afternoons when I was young were spent visiting country cousins.

My 83-year-old mom didn’t leave her home very often and this trip to Mason City was a memory maker. She talked about growing up when horses were the main source of power on the farm, the long hours and extremely difficult physical labor that her dad and brothers took for granted, and when having chicken soup for dinner meant starting out by killing an unsuspecting rooster that was minding his own business meandering around the yard. One comment Mom made that day has stayed with me:

“Farms don’t look like farms anymore.”

That was a time when every farm had a few cows, some pigs, a flock of chickens and maybe a few sheep or goats. Farm buildings included a large barn with a silo for the cows and horses and a granary and smaller buildings for the other animals. Most farm houses were built in an L shape or square two stories. Many had either enclosed or open porches. We took this lifestyle for granted. We didn’t realize how much we appreciated farming, healthy foods and healthy living. These values were in our very basic make up.

As we talked, I was reminded of those Sunday visits when I was young. For this city kid, the chance to climb a ladder in a hay loft and jump down into a huge pile of straw was thrilling, and just leaning on a pasture fence and watching cows grazing was like being in a country western movie. Such delightful, innocent pleasures.

Then there was the weeklong visits to my sisters’ farms where I washed eggs and carefully placed them in cases ready for market, watched cows being milked and helped round up pigs that had escaped their fence and were roaming in the nearby cornfield. I remember watching baby lambs, so perky and playful enjoying spring sunshine, and admiring Smoky and Star, the horses that had once pulled plows and planters and were now simply enjoying retirement.

Many years later, when I was presenting a history program at a nursing home, I asked if anyone in the audience could demonstrate the husking hook that I had discovered in the museum’s storage area. A sweet, grey-haired lady raised her hand and offered to show us how to husk corn. After we buckled the leather straps that held the hook on to her hand, she grabbed the imaginary ear of corn, opened the husks with the hook, tore the ear from the stalk and tossed it into the horse-drawn wagon, bouncing it off the bangboard. She was gentle and somewhat uncertain in her movements, but we were assured that she knew what she was doing. When I asked her about her experience, she explained. Her father had been ill in the fall. She and her sister were not able to attend their country school for a month, and the girls and their mother husked 40 acres of corn, one ear at a time. It took them the full month, but they got the job done. Then her father died. As she shared her story, she started to cry, and I did, too.

That beautiful spring day, as Mom and I enjoyed the drive through a country side that was preparing for planting and growing and harvesting, we couldn’t help but reminisce. Yes, farming has changed drastically from her youth and mine. Mechanization and technology have changed every aspect of our lives, and I enthusiastically look forward to the opportunity for my annual fall combine ride, my tiny connection to the harvest. Yet, memories of the day that Mom and I shared will stay with me forever.

Bev Jackson Cotter is a lifelong Albert Lea resident.