The Palimpsest

The Palimpsest, vol.74 no.2, Summer 1993

Swaim, Ginalie

Iowans at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition: What They Took to the Fair, What They Did There, amd What They Brought Back Home

Davis, Merle

Sundays at the Fair
Iowa and the Sunday Closing 
of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition
by Merle Davis
I
N THE LATE nineteenth century, as plans 
were laid to celebrate the four-hundredth 
anniversary of Columbus’s arrival in the 
New World by holding a grand internation­
al fair in the United States, the fair became 
embroiled in an increasingly acrimonious 
debate over whether the exposition would be 
open on Sundays.
Americans’ Sunday activities had long been 
regulated by various statutes commonly called 
blue laws. The laws differed from state to state: 
in Iowa a term in jail or a fine of one to five 
dollars—no insignificant sum at that time—was 
the punishment for any person “found on the 
first day of the week, commonly called the 
Sabbath,” engaged in a number of proscribed 
activities, including fishing, hunting, dancing, 
buying or selling property, “or in any labor, the 
work of necessity and charity only excepted." 
The Iowa law, like similar laws in most other 
states, exempted persons, such as Jews and 
Seventh-day Adventists, “who conscientiously 
observe the seventh day of the week as the 
Sabbath.”
The federal government’s role in the pro­
posed world's fair would make it the prime tar­
get for those demanding that the fair be closed 
on Sundays. In April 1890 federal legislation 
was enacted to hold “an international exhibition 
of arts, industries, manufacturers, and the 
products of the soil, mine, and sea.” The act 
established a national World’s Columbian 
Commission (state commissions would follow), 
selected Chicago as the host city, and set dates 
for May through October. The act also provid­
ed up to 1.5 million federal dollars to cover the
costs of the commission and to erect and main­
tain certain government buildings and exhibits, 
if Chicago first raised ten million dollars.
Even before this legislation, demands were 
already being made for the fair to be closed on 
Sundays. As earlv as October 1889, for exam- 
pie, the Synod of Iowa of the Presbyterian 
Church placed itself “emphatically on record as 
opposed to the opening of the Columbian 
Exposition on the Sabbath day, as not onlv con­
demned by the Christian conscience, but by 
the best progressive thought of the American 
nation. After April 1890, petitions demanding 
the fair be closed on Sundays began trickling in 
from across the nation. What began as a trickle 
soon became a flood. Indeed, during the 
1891/92 session of Congress, 590 pages of fine 
print in the Congressional Record contain lists 
of petitions demanding Sunday closing.
These petitions normally came from main­
line Protestant churches or from Christian 
young people’s societies, such as the Young 
People’s Society of Christian Endeavor, an 
interdenominational evangelical youth ministry, 
or from other organizations with strong reli­
gious connections, such as the Woman’s 
Christian Temperance Union (WCTU).
The petitions normally asked simply that the 
exposition be closed on Sundays. But some 
petitions added other requests as well—that 
Congress prohibit the sale of intoxicating 
liquors at the fair and censor the fairs art dis- 
plays. For instance, the Reformed Presbyterian 
Church of Morning Sun, Iowa, “prayed that 
federal aid to the Columbian Exposition be 
conditioned on the closing of the Exposition on
156 THE PALIMPSEST
Sunday, that the sale of intoxicating liquors he 
prohibited on the grounds, and that purity be 
preserved in the art department." Similar peti­
tions came from Christian Endeavor societies 
and Protestant churches across Iowa.
In the winter and spring of 1892. ¿is the Iowa 
General Assembly considered appropriating 
$125,000 for an Iowa exhibit at the fair, peti­
tions began to flood into Des Moines from 
organizations such as the WCTU of Mount 
Vernon and Christian Endeavor societies of 
Nora Springs, Cresco, Pleasant Plain, and other 
places, ¿ill praying for Sunday closing.
Protestant denominations in Iowa commonly
demanded a strict observance of the Christian
Sabbath. The Synod of Iowa of the United
Presbvterian Church—which also denounced *
Sunday newspapers “as one of the most stealthy 
and potent influences” against the Sabbath— 
“joined heartily with the good people in ¿ill the 
nation to close the exposition on Sundays. 
Similarly, the Upper Iowa Annual Conference
The Sabbath movement 
commonly opposed Sunday 
newspapers and even the 
operation of Sunday trains.
of the Methodist Episcopal Church denounced 
the “disposition on the p¿lrt of some of our peo­
ple, especially our younger members, to regard 
the Sabbath as a holiday rather thiin a holy day, 
a day for worship and spiritual culture, seeking 
their own pleasure in buggy' riding, visiting, pic- 
nicing, or other recreations,” and implored the 
Columbian Commissioners to close the fair “on 
the Lord's Day and thus place the American 
Christian Sabbath on exhibit before the world 
in contrast with the continental Sabbath.”
Asked his opinion, William Stevens Perry, 
Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Iowa, feared 
that Sunday had become “a more dissipated 
week-day.” To the Methodist Episcopal’s Des 
Moines Annual Conference, efforts to open the 
fair on Sundays were “un-Christian arid un- 
American.”
In January 1891, The Independent, a weekly 
religious magazine from New York, queried
senators and congressmen and published their
answers in a lengthy article titled “Shall We
Obey Gods Commandment?” The Iowa dele- *
gation was far from unanimous. “I am opposed 
to Sunday Amusements,” answered Congress­
man Isaac S. Struble, Republican from 
LeMars, “believing the chiy should be observed 
more in accordimce with the views of Christian 
people than by attending ball-plays, theaters, 
exhibitions, etc.; and so am opposed to opening 
the Exposition on Sunday.” In a similar vein. 
Congressman Edward R. Ihiys, Republican 
from Knoxville replied that “All business of this 
whole country . . . should respect the 
American Sabbath by closing its doors.”
Congressman Walter I. Hayes, Democrat 
from Clinton, took the opposite view: “There 
are a great class of laboring people that have no 
other time at their disposal, and who, if it is not 
so opened, will be practically debarred from its 
benefits, ¿iltho there ¿ire none more entitled or 
to whom greater consideration should he 
shown.”
Much of the debate dealt with the effect 
Sunday closing would have on working-class 
people—either those visiting the fair, or those 
employed in fair-related jobs. “Every blow 
dealt ¿igainst the Sabbath is a blow at the inter­
ests of the working-man,” said the Methodist 
Episcopal Christian Advocate. Sundiiy open­
ings “will not only compel hundreds of men to 
work on that day needlessly, hut will put into 
the hands of greedy capitalists and tyrannical 
corporations a new fetter with which to 
increase the bitterness of the toils of working­
men. Indeed, some fair workers labored very 
long hours. Iowa editor Charles Ashton wrote 
about a gate keeper who had “been on duty 
ninety-eight hours in the week of seven days. 
He wants the fair closed, Ashton reported, “he 
can't stand the open Sunday.”
The Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Iowa was 
concerned that Sunday openings would 
“increase the toil and traffic and turmoil of 
Chicago’s Sunday” and “trample on the rights 
of conscience and the liberty' to the rest of the 
exhibitors and the army of employees . . .  in 
transporting and feeding visitors.” The 
Lutheran delegates feared that opening on 
Sunday would “proclaim to the world that . . . 
our country has surrendered the American
WINTER 1993 1 57
Sabbath, the most distinctive of American insti­
tutions, and enthroned in its place the 
Continental Sunday, the holiday of despotism. 
They blamed “the miserly greed for gold and 
the prodigal greed for amusement and the infi­
del hatred o( Christianity’ for “most of the 
clamor for Sunday opening.”
This echoed the arguments of the American 
Sabbath Union, an alliance o( Christian denom­
inations, Sabbath associations, and reform 
groups such as the WCTU. The American 
Sabbath Union, and like-minded groups such 
as the Iowa Sabbath Association, demanded a 
stricter observance of the Sabbath on theologi­
cal grounds. While tliev argued that stricter 
observance would give working people a dav 
off, they still intended to dictate how that day 
off would be spent. Leaders of the Sabbath 
movement conunonK opposed Sunday newspa­
pers and even the operation of trains on
Sundays. Convened in Des Moines in 1891.«/
American Sabbath Union leaders asked for 
help from the American Federation of Labor 
(AFL) “in securing the gates of the fair “so 
that God may be honored and the workingmen
“All business . . .  should re­
spect the American Sabbath 
by closing its doors. ff
employed on the fair grounds and by the rail­
roads running thereto may have their rest day.”
The AFL agreed that “the Rest day should 
be zealously guarded against the encroachment 
of those who live upon the labor of others.” But 
their accord ended there. At its 1892 conven­
tion, AFL president Samuel Gompers told the 
delegates that “the days the wage-earners will 
have the best opportunity to visit the Worlds 
Fair will be on Sundays. . . .  A visit to the 
Exposition and a view of the arts and handi­
crafts of the peoples of all nations can only 
ennoble the visitor. . . . There is no idea nor 
thought for the desecration of the Sabbath.
Although trade unions were more concerned 
with wages, hours, working conditions, and the 
right to organize, they did enter the debate 
over Sunday closing. 77ie Locomotive Fireman’s 
Magazine, then edited by labor leader Eugene
Victor Debs, labeled as “bigots' and “cranks 
those who wanted Sunday closing, and insisted 
that "the old theologies have no place in these 
practical, common-sense days. Trade unions 
from across the nation petitioned Congress to
“The old theologies have no 
place in these practical, 
common-sense days. If
open the exposition on Sundays, including local 
unions in Iowa such as Waterloo’s Lodge No. 
314 of the International Association of 
Machinists: Burlington's Tin, Sheet-Iron and 
Cornice Workers: Sioux Citv’s Cigar-Makers; 
and Dubuque’s local union of Carpenters and 
Joiners. Ultimately, petitions representing as 
many as 300,000 working people asked 
Congress not to act on Sunday closing.
Organized labor was not alone in its opposi­
tion. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, social reformer
J
and militant feminist, declared, “When the vast 
army of men who will construct the magnifi-J O
cent buildings and beautify the grounds, who 
dav by dav will lift the heavv machinery and
» *  /  • r
foreign exhibits in place, desire to bring their 
wives and children to the 'exposition, Sunday
will be the onlv day tliev will have leisure to do
* * 0
so,” she wrote; “the onlv day, too, when farm- 
hands of the country, men and women from the 
workshops and the factories, clerks from the 
busv marts of trade, servants from their domes-
0
tic vocations, can claim a few hours of recre­
ation. »
Opposition to Sunday closing also came from 
those who feared governmental interference. 
Seventh-dav Adventists and Seventh-Dav 
Baptists—who considered Saturday the 
Sabbath—were among the most outspoken. 
Petitions from their local churches poured into 
Congress. One of many was from the Seventh- 
dav Adventist Church in Audubon, Iowa, 
protesting “against committing the United 
States Government to a union of religion and 
state" bv closing the fair on Sunday or creating 
“any other religious legislation." Fearing that 
congressional closing of the fair on Sundays 
would break down the separation of church and 
state, citizens from Buchanan and Palo Alto
158 THE PALIMPSEST
counties petitioned Congress “not to legislate 
on any religious matter and that the World'sJ O
Fair may he kept open on Sunday."
Congress acted on the question in the sum­
mer of 1892. It authorized that five million 
commemorative silver half-dollars be given to 
the fair’s directors to help underwrite fair 
expenses, but then tacked on a proviso that all 
appropriations hinged on the fair being closed 
“on the first day of the week, commonly called 
Sunday." This was the first national Sunday leg­
islation ever adopted in the United States. It 
was, in effect, a national blue law.
To the Reverend Wilbur F. Crafts, the vote 
was a victory. Crafts, a spokesman for the 
American Sabbath Union, had considered the 
“chief workers” for Sunday openings “liquor 
dealers, infidels, and Seventh da\ Adventists.” 
“The Sabbath has won its Waterloo in the offi­
cial votes at Washington," he rejoiced, "and if 
this victon is promptly followed up in Congress 
and in our States and cities, the Continental 
Sunday of toil and dissipation, the worst of for­
eign invaders, will soon be driven from our 
land.”
Not everyone was so confident. Consider the 
Webster City Graphic-Herald's editorial, 
“close  the cates or w e ’ll  kill .” "The theory 
of an open Fair on Sunday,” the paper reflect­
ed, “leaves every one f ree to remain away from
“Every blow dealt against 
the Sabbath is a blow 
at the . . . working-man.”
the grounds in compliance with their convic­
tions of duty. But the Sunday closers would 
compel everybody . . .  to comply with the 
religious-enforcing statute. The Book which 
says, ‘Remember the Sabbath day,’ also says, 
Thou slialt not kill.’ yet so furious is the zeal of 
the closers to keep the gates shut to show the 
world that we are a Christian nation,’ that they 
even appeal to the President to enforce closing, 
if need be, by military force! Who could doubt 
our Christianity after visiting Chicago some 
fine Monday morning and finding the outer 
walls of the Fair grounds piled high with 
bloody corpses of men, deliberately shot down
like dogs, that, forsooth, we might show to the 
heathen world there assembled, that we are a 
Christian nation’?”
The legislation did not have the effect 
Congress intended. The fair’s directors accept­
ed the souvenir Columbian half-dollars, but 
they balked at closing on Sundays. The matter 
eventually reached the courts, where legal 
maneuverings dragged on through the summer 
and fall of 1893 (the fair ran from May through
“Furious is the zeal . . .  to 
show the world ‘that we are 
a Christian nation.’ ”
October). The upshot was that the fair 
remained open most Sundays—despite action 
by Congress, threatened boycotts by church 
groups, and lamentations by Sabbatarians.
Several states, including Iowa, and some for­
eign countries closed their exhibits or buildings 
on Sundays. Many Christian groups were jubi­
lant when Sunday attendance at the fair fell far 
below expectations. A resolution by the 
Northwest Iowa Conference of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church in the fall of 1893 epito­
mized these sentiments: “We rejoice that the 
number in attendance upon that day has been 
much smaller than upon other days. We believe 
that this fact has exalted the Sabbath not only 
in the eyes of European visitors, but also in the 
minds of the directors and all other American 
citizens.”
Despite all the turmoil surrounding the 
Sunday question, for the thousands who visited 
the fair—even on Sunday—the sights of the 
fair would remain embedded in their memories 
as one of the great events of their lives. D
NOTE ON SOURCES
Major sources include Wilbur F. Crafts, The Sabbath of Man 
(Washington, 1) C., 1902 ed.); William Addison Biakely, 
American State Tapers Bearing on Sunday Legislation 
(Washington, l).C . 1911 ed ); Christian Advocate, The 
Independent, and Congressional Record for 1890-1893; and 
synod and annual conference proceedings of Iowa religious 
denominations, 18«38-1894 (Methodist, Lutheran, and 
Presbyterian were especially useful).
WINTER 1993 159


English

Sundays at the Fair: Iowa and the Sunday Closing of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition

A palimpsest within 
this P a lim p sest. . .
or how to use an unusual word  
a dozen tim es  
in one conversation
P
EOPLE OFTEN ASK me what the 
word palimpsest means. (As readers 
of the magazine, perhaps you’ve 
fielded this question, too.) After I give 
a quick explanation of the word and how it 
applies to history, I direct the individual to the 
inside front cover of each issue.
There we reprint the definition as it 
appeared in the first issue of The Palimpsest in 
1920: “A palimpsest was a parchment or other 
material from which one or more writings had 
been erased to give room for later records. But 
the erasures were not always complete, and so 
it became the fascinating task of scholars not 
only to translate the later records but also to 
reconstruct the original writings by decipher­
ing the dim fragments of letters partly erased 
and partly covered by subsequent texts.
I'he history of Iowa may be likened to a 
palimpsest which holds the record of suc­
cessive generations, the definition continues. 
To decipher these records of the past, recon­
struct them, and tell the stories which they 
contain is the task of those who write history. ” 
It’s an interesting word, though not easy to 
explain — or pronounce (accent on the first 
syllable, p a l ). For those of us who like to build
our vocabulary by using a new word ten times 
in one week, palimpsest will never be easy to 
work into a casual conversation. In books and
articles I occasionallv run across the word used*
in a figurative sense, rather than a literal sense. 
In fact, this issue of the magazine contains a 
compelling example of a figurative palimp­
sest. Let me explain.
In the article titled “Between Science and 
Art,” scholar Kenneth Haltman writes about 
nineteenth-century artist Titian Ramsay Peale. 
Peale was on the Stephen Long Expedition, 
which camped near the area then known as 
“council bluff along the Missouri River
in 1819/20. As natural historv illustrator for¥
the expedition, Peale produced an enormous 
amount of artwork — both preliminary field 
sketches and revised, composite watercolors. 
In the article, Haltman compares and inter­
prets Peale s earlier and later versions of 
the same subject matter. We might say, then, 
that Titian’s Ramsay Peale’s artwork is a 
“palimpsest.
Granted, it is not a palimpsest in the literal 
sense: Peale did not reuse the same sheet of 
paper by erasing or drawing on top of an exist­
ing sketch. But in a figurative sense, the entire
50 THE PALIMPSEST
body of Peales expeditionary work is a pal­
impsest. His more deliberately composed re­
visions for the public have obscured his pre­
paratory sketches, which often convey quite 
different information and meanings.
A
CTUALLY, perhaps much of the his­
torical art and illustrations produced 
for public consumption are pal­
impsests in this figurative sense. In 
Transforming Visions of the American West, 
Martha A. Sandweiss reminds us that in the 
nineteenth century, a drawing or painting was 
often reproduced for the public as a print. 
“This meant reliance on draftsmen, lithogra­
phers or engravers, and publishers, she 
writes, “any one of whom could dramatically 
alter the appearance of an image.
Furthermore, publishers often pirated 
prints and lithographs from one publication to 
use in their own. In redrawing the images, they 
sometimes added, deleted, or changed ele­
ments on the picture. By the time an image 
reached a particular audience, it may have 
been changed in minor or major ways, by 
intention or accident, by the original artist or 
other individuals. Layers of change — and 
meaning — had accumulated, creating a 
palimpsest.
The earliest layer of imposed meaning is 
probably the perspective of the original 
creator. Suppose, for instance, that I’m on a 
family vacation in Rocky Mountain National 
Park. Happy to be away from urban life and 
awed by the scenery, I whip out my camera to 
show my co-workers back home that 1 really 
did take a vacation. I carefully focus on the 
mountain lake edged in pines — but I ignore 
the jammed parking lot that’s right behind me.
Both the sparkling mountain lake and the 
concrete parking lot are there, but my perspec­
tive selects and documents only one view of the 
area. A journalist documenting the effect of 
carbon monoxide on alpine meadows might 
deliberately photograph the parking lot as part 
of the storv. Who has created the more accu- 
rate image? Which image will tell Americans in
a hundred years what our national parks looked 
like?
Both images are accurate pieces of historical 
evidence. The more pieces we have, the 
greater the variety of evidence and diversity of 
experience, the closer we get to understanding 
what the past was really like.
But historical pieces don’t always jibe. For 
instance, in one of our articles this month, an 
eastern minister complains about the harsh, 
slovenly life in Dubuque in 1864. Yet the 
accompanying images show elegant homes and 
orderly streets. Who’s correct — the minister 
or the artists?
Probably everyone is — to a degree. Early 
photographs of Dubuque show large, fashion­
able homes, so we know that those buildings 
existed in 1860s Iowa, just as they did in the 
reverend’s beloved New England. But the 
color lithographs may not be entirely accurate 
in depicting architectural details and the sur­
rounding streets and landscaping.
Mass-produced lithographs and engravings 
often depicted western towns as bustling, pros­
perous, and pristine so that East Coast and 
European investors and immigrants would 
move west. Newcomers to Iowa (such as our 
New England minister) sent equally subjective 
written descriptions back east. Their perspec­
tive was based on what they hoped to find in a 
new home, and on what they missed from their 
old home.
L
IKE MANY a pleasurable conversa­
tion, this one has strayed from the orig­
inal topic— how Titian Ramsay Peale s 
work is a palimpsest. I hope you find 
the following group of articles as thought- 
provoking as I have. You’ll see Iowa from the 
viewpoint of a young natural history illustrator 
in the 1820s, a frontier priest in the 1840s, an 
indecisive minister in the 1860s, and a four- 
year-old child in 1910 — as well as from the 
viewpoints of the nineteenth-century artists, 
engravers, lithographers, and photographers 
who documented Iowa through paintbrush, 
printing plates, and camera.
The Editor
SUMMER 1993 51


A palimpsest within this Palimpsest

Levine, Marjorie

A Kind of Human Machine': Women's Work at the Switchboard

Schwieder, Dorothy

Drawing the Personal Narrative 
into the Landscape of 
Iowa’s Coal History
by Dorothy Schwieder
F
rom i880 to 1 9 3 0 , coal
mining ranked as the second 
major industry in Iowa, sec­
ond only to agriculture. Beginning 
in a limited way in the mid-nine­
teenth century, the Iowa industry 
reached its peak during World 
War I when around 18,000 men 
and boys worked in the mines. 
Iowa coal provided fuel for the 
state’s many railroads as well as for 
heating homes and businesses, and 
provided an energy source for the 
state’s limited number of manufac­
turing firms. Large mines, known 
as shipping mines, provided coal 
for railroads, while small mines, 
such as Number 30 near 
Centerville, provided fuel for area 
residents.
Edith Gallo Widmer Blake (the 
author of the preceding memoir) 
was born in 1910 in the mining 
camp known as Number 30. She 
spent her formative years in an 
environment created by the coal 
industry. The daughter of a first- 
generation Italian-American 
miner, Blake would later move 
with her parents and six siblings to 
a twelve-acre farm. There her 
father combined the occupations 
of mining and farming, a practice 
not uncommon among coal min­
ers, and one that provided greater 
economic security for the family. 
This coupling of occupations was 
made possible because of the sea­
sonal nature of most Iowa’s mines. 
Because much of Iowa's coal was 
used for heating purposes, mines 
closed down during warmer 
weather, often remaining closed 
for four or five months. Blake’s 
remembrances of her growing-up 
years both in a coal camp and on a 
nearhy farm, provide a warm, lov­
ing testimony to her parents, her 
Italian culture, and the area she 
called home.
Although surrounded by other 
Italian-Americans, Blake experi­
enced some cultural diversity in 
Number 30 Coal Camp. Iowa coal 
communities included people 
bom in the British Isles as well as 
Sweden and Germany, many who 
arrived before 1900. Most immi­
grants from southern and eastern 
Europe, including people from 
Italy, Croatia, and Russia, began 
coming to Iowa mostly after 1900. 
Mining populations also included 
large numbers of native-born peo­
ple, particularly from Illinois and 
Missouri. From 1880 on, Iowa's 
mining industry included a grow­
ing number of African-Americans.
In most camps, people of different 
nationalities and races lived side 
by side with few ethnic or racial 
difficulties.
In a myriad of ways, Blake’s 
early life typified the lives of other 
Italian-Americans. Blake was bom 
at home, surrounded by relatives 
and friends and perhaps attended 
by a midwife. Italian-American 
women usually preferred a mid­
wife, even though physicians were 
present in most camps. In this 
respect the women maintained an 
Italian tradition in which women 
seldom went into a hospital. 
Blake's family also carried on 
other ethnic traditions such as 
making wine and maintaining 
close kinship ties.
BLAKE’S CHILDHOOD remembrances personalize the day-to-day activities in 
an Iowa coal camp. The camps 
themselves were often small, con­
taining around fifty houses, much 
like Number 30 where Blake was 
born. At each camp the coal oper­
ator constructed houses, typically 
consisting of four rooms. 
Operators determined rent based 
on two dollars per room. In other 
words, a four-room house rented
FALL 1993 127
for eight dollars. Houses built 
before the 1920s had no electricity 
and no indoor plumbing. Each was 
typically placed on four blocks or 
stones. Mining families com­
plained frequently that houses 
were flimsily built and that the 
company did not provide mainte­
nance.
Pictures of camps reveal rather 
barren, bleak images with houses 
placed close together and little or 
no room for lawns or other land­
scaping. Since most coal seams 
were mined out within ten years, 
operators viewed the camps as 
temporary and therefore made lit­
tle effort to upgrade, maintain, or 
beautify them.
Blake referred to taking in 
boarders, a practice common
among most coal-mining families, 
both foreign- and native-born. 
Low wages and seasonal layoffs 
necessitated the practice. In 1914, 
for example, studies in three coal­
mining communities show that 
miners averaged only $420 a year. 
Moreover, with mines often closed 
at least four months each year, 
there were periods without mining 
income. This meant many coal 
miners' wives searched for ways to 
earn additional money; some 
women sold garden produce or 
dairy products, but the majority 
took in boarders. Each woman 
usually received two dollars per 
week from each boarder and pro­
vided the boarder with a bed, 
food, and laundry service. Since 
many women had anywhere from
two to six boarders, this money 
was often crucial to the family’s 
survival.
LIFE IN IOWA’S coal camps, although remembered fond­ly by Blake, wras often isolat­
ed and lacking in social institu­
tions. Coal camps rarely contained 
high schools; churches were usual­
ly non-existent. Sometimes priests 
from neighboring communities 
held mass in the camps, but this 
practice was sporadic at best. Like 
Number 30, camps typically 
included a company store, a pool 
hall, and a miners’ hall. Sometimes 
the latter was on the second floor 
of the company store.
Blake’s account also touches on
s t a t e  h i s t o r i c a l  s o c i e t y  o f
128 THE PALIMPSEST
the dangers involved in coal min­
ing, considered the most danger­
ous occupation nationwide in the 
nineteenth and early twentieth 
centuries. In Iowa, men were 
injured or killed most often by 
falling slate but also from runaway 
coal cars and misplaced blasting 
powder shots. Accidents also 
resulted from the unevenness of 
the coal seam. According to one 
mining engineer, the coal seams 
“roll and pitch to such a degree” 
that the average haulageways 
resemble “a roller coaster speed­
way.” Miners therefore found it 
hard to keep coal cars under con­
trol, and a runaway car meant 
great danger to the men, boys, and 
mules in the mine. Blake’s remem­
brances make clear that accidents
H ocking’s m ine rescue team  
and mock “victim ” p ose with a 
sizable trophy won in a 1915  
state contest for coal m iners. 
Hocking, Iowa, was a large  
coal cam p o f  1,500, located  
three m iles from  Albia in 
Monroe County. Ironically, the  
team ’s success underscores the  
dangers and traged ies com m on  
to tum -of-the-century coal 
miners. C oncerned  with safety, 
the U nited M ine W orkers and  
coal operators trained groups 
of m iners in coal cam ps as o n ­
site rescue team s. Yearly con ­
tests sponsored by the union  
becam e major events on state, 
regional, and even  in ternation ­
al levels, and w ere often  set on  
Miners’ D ay (April 1) or Labor 
Day. C om peting team s w ere  
given a situation (for exam ple, 
“slate has fallen on this m iner  
and broken his back”), and  
were judged  on their sp eed  
and care in rescuing the  
“injured” m iner.
could result from human error.
Blake’s account did not touch 
on discrimination experienced by 
Italian-Americans, but other 
Iowans have. Lola Nizzi, bom and 
raised in an Iowa coal camp, 
remembered that her family had 
three strikes against them: they 
were Italian, Catholic, and coal 
miners. In effect, Nizzi pointed to 
discrimination stemming from 
three factors: nationality, religion, 
and occupation. Nationwide, xeno­
phobia reached its peak shortly 
after World War I, and the fear or 
hatred of foreigners extended into 
the 1920s. This period coincided 
with the immigration of many 
Italian-Americans into Iowa.
As Blake indicates, however, her 
life in an Italian-American family 
had many wonderful compensa­
tions, regardless of drawbacks 
associated with coal mining. 
Blake's positive feelings have been 
reinforced by the accounts of 
other Italian-American women 
who grew up in Iowa in the teens 
and twenties. While hard work and 
economic deprivation were often 
facts of life, kinship and ethnic sol­
idarity provided a loving environ­
ment and a strong buffer from 
outside influences. As Blake has 
written, families enjoyed many 
social activities both inside and 
outside the home. Families 
attended dances at the miners’ 
hall, participated in school func­
tions, and anticipated friends and 
relatives coming to visit on “com­
pany day” each Sunday. On a more 
personal level, Blake recalls shar­
ing her love of music with her 
family.
THE FAMILY’S MOVE from Number 30 to their own home on a nearby 
farm brought a major change for 
the Gallos, although much of their 
lives still revolved around the coal 
industry. Moving from a home 
with four rooms to one with eight 
had to provide greater comfort 
and privacy for all family mem­
bers. Once there, Blake’s life was 
probably not much different from 
that of other farm children as she 
helped with regular farm chores 
such as gardening and butchering.
In the late 1920s, Mine Number 
30 closed down, forcing many 
families to relocate. This experi­
ence was repeated many times 
across central and southern Iowa 
as the demand for Iowa coal—par­
ticularly by railroads—continued 
to diminish. Like Blake’s relatives 
and friends, other mining families 
moved out of state, often to indus­
trial cities in the Middle West and 
Northeast. Some families pur­
chased their homes in the coal 
camps, and then commuted to 
work in nearby cities like 
Centerville or Des Moines. For 
many Italian-Americans, coal min­
ing had been a two-generation 
occupation.
There is a tendency to empha­
size the hardships experienced in 
coal camps. Yet as Blake’s mem­
oirs imply, former residents also 
remember the positive experi­
ences. In 1978, in an oral history 
project, six second-generation 
Italian-American women recalled 
what life was like in various Iowa 
coal camps for themselves and 
their mothers (all born in Italy). 
After reading the research paper 
based on the interviews, one 
woman responded that although 
the paper accurately covered the 
details of the women’s lives, their 
experiences had been portrayed 
too negatively. “Our mothers were 
happy,” Mary Battani Sertich 
explained, noting that even though 
the first-generation women 
worked excessively hard, they had 
found great pleasure in caring for 
their families and viewed their 
lives in America as positive. 
Blake’s views seem to parallel that 
experience. Among the many 
harsh realities, life for the Gallo 
family had many happy, even joy­
ous times. Blake’s warm, positive 
remembrances stand as testimony 
to that fact. □
FALL 1993 129


Drawing the Personal Narrative into the Landscape of Iowa's Coal History

Gallups
galore
In 1972, Random House published all of 
the Gallup Poll results, from the found­
ing of the Gallup Poll in 1935 through 
the end of 1971. In more than 7,000 sepa­
rate reports and three mammoth vol­
umes, the reader can wade through the 
changing tides of public opinion. This 
record is indeed a palimpsest of 
American social history. Here is a small 
sampling of the polls.
THE BUDGET February 1936
Do you think it necessary at this time to balance the 
budget and start reducing the national debt?
Yes 70% No 30%
WOMEN AND WORK November 1936
Should a married woman earn money if she has a 
husband capable of supporting her?
Yes 18% No 82%
PROTESTANT CHURCHES March 1937
It has been suggested that all Protestant Churches in 
the United States combine into 
think it would be a good thing?
Yes 44%
By Sects
Northern Baptist
Southern Baptist
Methodist
Lutheran
Presbyterian
Episcopal
Congregational
Reformed
Others
one Church. Do you
1
No 56%
Yes No
47% 53%
25% 75%
43% 57%
33% 67%
48% 52%
40% 60%
65% 35%
52% 48%
59% 41%
T August 1937
>r President, if she
AGRICULTURE December 1937
Farmers were asked: Secretary Wallace has a schedule 
of what he considers fair prices for farm products. 
What do you consider a fair price for the following?
Median average
Wheat, per bushel $1.00
Com, per bushel .75
Cotton, per pound .14
Hogs, per hundredweight 8.25
Tobacco, per pound .24
PISTOL REGISTRATION May 1938
Do you think all owners of pistols and revolvers 
should be required to register with the Government?
Yes 84% No 16%
GONE WITH THE WIND February 1939
Asked of those who intend to see the film: Would you 
rather see the film come out in color or in black and 
white?
Color 57%
Black and white 21%
No difference 22%
TELEVISION April 1939
At present, are you interested in purchasing a home 
television set?
m
Yes 13% No 87%
SUMMER FASHIONS July 1939
Do you think it is indecent for women to wear shorts 
for street wear?
Yes 63% No 37%
FARM POLICY March 1940
Asked of farmers: Considering costs of production, do 
you thiriK the price for your chief cash crop is fair?
Yes 36% No 64%
By Crop
Wheat
Com
Cotton
Tobacco
Yes No
25% 75%
45% 55%
11% 89%
32% 68%
ELEANOR ROOSEVELT March 1940
Do you approve or disapprove of the way Mrs. 
Roosevelt lias conducted herself as First Lady?
Yes 34% No 66% Approve 68% Disapprove 32%
114 THE PALIMPSEST
By Income 
Upper 
Middle 
Lower
CANCER
Approve Disapprove Anti-Dictator War 11%
56% 44% War for Humanity 9%
68% 32% Survival War 7%
75% 25% The People's War 6%
Anti-Nazi War 5%
Total War 5%
April 1940 War of Liberation 4%
. . .  ~  -  - - v  w . .  ^  » » » V I  • V I  • »  I V » » V  h v  » I  »  1  k V  U k \ .  M
serious public health problem — tuberculosis, 
syphilis, cancer, or infantile paralysis?
Syphilis 
Cancer 
Tuberculosis 
Infantile paralysis
46%
29%
16%
9%
WTwf do you think causes cancer?
The following are listed according to frequency 
of mention:
Bruises, injuries, constant irritation of body 
tissues and tumors 
Hereditary tendencies 
Poor diet 
Moles and warts 
Liquor 
Smoking
Frequent childbearing
Constipation
Mental distress
Wrong functioning of glands
Neglected teeth
EQUAL PAY FOR WOMEN February 1942
If women replace men in industry should they be paid 
the same wages as men?
Yes 78% No 14% Undecided 8%
PROHIBITION February 1942
If the question of national prohibition should come up 
again, would you vote for prohibition or against it? Of 
those who expressed an opinion:
For 36% Against 64%
NAME FOR WORLD WAR April 1942
President Roosevelt has asked the public to think up a 
good name to call the present war. What would you 
suggest?
By and large most of the country thinks the war 
should be called "World War li or "Second 
World War."
Here are a few names that have been suggested : 
Which do you like best?
War of World Freedom 
War of Freedom 
War of Liberty
26%
14%
13%
FARM UNIONS May 1942
Asked of farmers: John L. Lewis is planning to orga­
nize the dairy farmers of the country into a branch of 
the C.l.O. union. Do you favor or oppose this move­
ment to organize farmers into labor unions?
Favor 11% Oppose 70% Undecided 19%
FARM MACHINERY February 1943
Farmers were asked: As one way to keep production 
up, it has been suggested that farmers with tractors, 
harvesters, and other machinery loan out this machin­
ery to neighboring farms if convenient. Would you 
favor or oppose such a program ?
Favor 45% Oppose 48% Undecided 7%
SOCIAL SECURITY August 1943
At present farmers, domestic servants, Government 
employees, and professional persons are not included 
under Social Security. Do you think the Social Security 
program should be clianged to include these groups?
Yes 64% No 19% Undecided 17%
NATIONAL ANTHEM July 1947
Will you tell me the name of the song that is our 
national anthem?
/ /
/ /
/ /
/ /
Star Spangled Banner" 
God Bless America"
My Country 'tis of Thee 
America the Beautiful" 
Columbia"
Don't know
31%
31%
18%
13%
5%
2%
NAZI REVIVAL March 1953
Do you think there is or is not much chance that the 
Nazis ivill again become powerful in Germany?
Yes, much chance 
Not much chance 
No opinion
30%
56%
14%
COMMUNISM IN CHURCHES April 1953
Do you think there is a need for a congressional 
investigation of communism in our churches?
Yes 36% No 52% No opinion 12%
FALL 1993 115
OATH OF ALLEGIANCE May 1953
It has been suggested that the words "under God" 
should be added to the Oath of Allegiance to the flag 
so that it would read: I pledge allegiance to the flag of 
the United States of America and to the republic for 
which it stands, one nation "under God," indivisible, 
with liberty and justice for all. Would you favor or 
oppose this change?
Favor 
Oppose 
No opinion
69%
21%
10%
DEFENSE BUDGET July 1953
Do you agree, in the main, with those people who say 
the defense budget has been cut so much that the 
nation's safety is threatened — or with those people 
who say only waste and extravagance have been cut 
out of the budget?
Safety threatened 
Waste, extravagances cut 
No opinion
17%
55%
28%
DIVORCE LAWS March 1954
Do you think a divorce given in states such as 
Nevada and Florida should be recognized in all other 
states?
Should be 
Should not 
No opinion
48%
40%
12%
CIGARETTE SMOKING June 1954
Do you happen to smoke cigarettes now?
Men
Women
Yes
57%
32%
No
43%
68%
PUNISHMENT OF CHILDREN
November 1954
Looking back to when you were a teenager yourself, 
what kinds of punishment seemed to work best on 
children your age who refused to behave? (Some peo­
ple gave more than one answer.)
Whipping
Taking away privileges 
Being kept at nome 
Given a Agood talking to" 
Made to sit in a corner, sent to 
their rooms 
Others 
No opinion
40%
25%
11%
8%
3%
12%
8%
107%
SCHOOL INTEGRATION July 1959
The United States Supreme Court has ruled that 
racial segregation in the public schools is illegal. This
means that all children, no matter what their race, 
must be allowed to go to the same schools. Do you 
approve or disapprove of this decision?
Approve 
Disapprove 
No opinion
59%
35%
6%
BIRTH CONTROL February 1960
In some places in the United States it is not legal to 
supply birth control information. How do you feel 
about this — do you think birth control information 
should be available to anyone who wants it, or not?
Should be available 
Should not be available 
No opinion
72%
14%
14%
SPORTS January 1961
What is your favorite sport to watch?
Baseball
Football
Basketball
Bowling
Wrestling
Boxing
Other
No opinion
Men
41%
27%
6%
1%
3%
4%
9%
9%
Women
27%
16%
12%
8%
6%
2%
12%
17%
CIVIL RIGHTS MARCH August 1963
Those who followed the civil rights march on 
Washington were asked: What are your feelings 
about this rally?
Favorable 
Unfavorable 
No opinion
22%
63%
15%
Among the 63% who disapprove of the rally, 8% pre­
dict violence and 17% volunteered that "it won't 
accomplish anything."
VIETNAM May 1964
Have you given any attention to developments in 
South Vietnam?
Yes
Little or none
37%
63%
BEATLE HAIRCUT October 1965
As you know, many boys today wear their hair very 
long. Do you think the schools should require boys to 
keep their hair cut short?
Should 
Should not 
No opinion
80%
17%
3%
116 THE PALIMPSEST
FASHION June 1967
M Would you object to a daughter of yours wearing a 
miniskirt?
|  Yes 70% No 30%
AUTOMOBILE DRIVERS September 1967
H In three or four European countries, a person who 
R drives a car after having more than one drink of alco-
I  holic beverages is sent to jail. Would you like to see
II such a law in this country?
| | Yes 44% No 52% No opinion 4%
IDEAL PLACE TO LIVE February 1970
If you could live anywhere in the United States that 
you wanted to, would you prefer a city, suburban 
area, small town, or farm?
City 18%
Suburban 26%
Smalltown 31%
Farm 24%
No opinion 1%
SEXUAL EQUALITY August 1970
I , If your party nominated a woman to run for
I , Congress from your district, would you vote for her if 
I j she were qualified for the job?
Yes 84% No 13% No opinion 3%
! CHANGE IN AMERICA January 1971
Asked of college students: How do you think change 
in America is likely to occur during the next 25 years 
— through relatively peaceful means or through a 
j-; revolution?
Peaceful means 50%
Revolution 42%
| No opinion 8%
! CATHOLIC CHURCH April 1971
Asked of Catholic priests: Do you agree or disagree 
' with the Catholic Church's ban on the use of artificial 
methods of birth control?
I
J Agree 52% Disagree 41% No opinion 7%
Asked of Catholic priests: Have you, yourself, ever 
counseled a person to use artificial methods of birth 
control?
Yes 31% No 58% No opinion 11%
DEFENSE SPENDING April 1971
There is much discussion as to the amount of money 
the Government in Washington should spend for 
national defense and military purposes. How do you 
feel about this -  do you think we are spending too lit­
tle, too much, or about the right amount?
Too little 11%
Too much 50%
About right 31%
No opinion 8%
LIFE ON OTHER PLANETS AND RELI­
GIOUS BELIEFS June 1971
Do you believe that some kind of human life exists on 
other planets in the total universe? Out of those who 
expressed an opinion:
Yes 53% No 47%
Which of these statements comes closest to your reli­
gious beliefs?
There is a personal God 40%
There is some kind of spirit or vital 
force in the world 37%
I am not sure there is a God or 
vital force 9%
I am sure there is no God or vital force 11 %
No response 3%
Do you believe in life after death?
Yes 53% No 33% No opinion 14%
WAR July 1971
Some people feel that war is an outmoded way of set­
tling differences between nations. Others feel that 
wars are sometimes necessary to settle differences. 
With which point of view do you agree?
Outmoded 46%
Sometimes necessary 43%
No opinion 11 %
METRIC SYSTEM October 1971
Do you know what the metric system is?
Yes 44% No 56%
From The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion 1935-1971. 
(NY: Random House, 1972). Used by permission of 
the George H. Gallup International Institute. This 
selection was compiled for The Palimpsest by Becky 
Wilson Hawbaker, and designed by Mary F. Trafton.
FALL 1993 117


Gallups Galore

Bennett, Charles P

A
Prairie C hicken
V igne tte
AMERICAN AGRICVL TURIST (NOV 1668)
52 THE PALIMPSEST
by Charles P. Bennett
H AVE YOU EVER seen a prairie chicken’s nest? I have, and it happened like this. 
One sleepy, Sunday afternoon in the sum­
mer of 1910 in Ringgold County, my father 
remarked that the cattle in the far pasture 
would probably appreciate some salt, and did I 
want to go with him. Of course, I did! So we 
went down to the barn south of the house and 
put a bridle on Old Lade (short for Lady’’).
Lade was a large, white mare that my Grand­
father and Grandmother Jerrems had given my 
folks, Carolvn and Thaver Bennett, as a wed- 
ding gift in 1903. By now Lade had acquired a 
disease known as the “heaves, so she coughed 
whenever she engaged in strenuous activity. 
Sick or not, she was still a very large horse to a 
four-year-old boy.
Even for my father, who was about 5 feet 7, 
getting on a draft horse without a saddle was 
quite a challenge. It involved running and 
jumping as high on the horse as possible, then 
getting both elbows over Lade s back and 
squirming until one leg was on the other side.
Then, with one muscular arm, my father 
lifted me up and set me down in front of him. 
Mother handed us a sack of salt, and away we
went over the ridge and down the hill to what 
the Bennetts have always called the far 
pasture.
My father tied Old Lade to the fence, and we 
salted and counted the cattle. On our way back 
to the house, we traveled up along a draw, 
deep with slough grass. There was a sudden 
flurry of wings. A prairie chicken hen came out 
of the grass like a bullet and flew over the hill 
out of sight.
Father asked me if I would like to see a 
prairie chicken’s nest. I did, so we got off the 
horse and easily found the nest under the tall 
slough grass. There were about a dozen eggs in it.
We spent perhaps ten minutes there, as my 
father took time to explain to me all about the 
habits, love life, and history of the prairie 
chicken. Then he got on Old Lade after a cou­
ple of tries, pulled me up, and together we 
rode back to the house.
The prairie chickens eventually disap­
peared, unable to adapt to changes in their 
environment. In fact, many things are gone 
now, but not my memory of a father who 
thought his four-year-old son was important 
enough for the time and effort of explaining 
what life was all about for a prairie chicken.
I am fully conscious that few men could have 
been so foolish — or so wise.
Prairie Chicken Update
Prairie chickens were the m ost abundant game 
bird in Iowa in the n ineteenth century. As the ir 
p ra ir ie  h a b ita t becam e in c re a s in g ly  c u l t i ­
vated, concerns for prairie chicken conserva­
tion grew. Iowa was the firs t sta te  to impose 
bag lim its  on prairie chickens in 1878, which 
bo ls te red  the  b ird ’s p o p u la tio n  tem pora rily , 
but could not com pensate for the vanishing 
prairie. The last documented prairie chickens 
in Iowa were found in Appanoose County in the 
1950s.
New hope for Iowa prairie chicken lovers 
came w ith 1985  federal farm  leg is la tion  that 
included the Conservation Reserve Program,
which contracted farm ers to set aside fa rm ­
land for ten years. In Iowa, as much as 5 0 ,0 0 0  
acres per county has been re tu rned to  un ­
disturbed grassland.
With the return o f the pra irie  ch icken’s hab­
ita t cam e an Iowa D epartm ent o f N atura l 
Resources (DNR) program  to  re in troduce  a 
sm all population of the birds to Iowa. As Mel 
Moe, DNR w ild life  b io log is t explained, "They 
epitom ize the prairie, so we thought it su itab le  
to  b ring  them  back —  i t ’s p re tty  h is to r ic .” 
Since 1987, the DNR has brought a to ta l of 
450  prairie chickens from a population in Kan­
sas and introduced them  in Adair County and in 
R inggold County (where our au thor Charles 
Bennett, now eighty-seven, s till lives).
—  Becky Hawbaker
SUMMER 1993 53


A Prairie Chicken Vignette

The Palimpsest, vol.74 no.4, Winter 1993

Marshall, Gordon

ing cattle. I drove Queen and Daisy (the work­
horse team that Fritz had bought at our sale) to 
haul silage, hay, and corn fodder. In the short 
winter daylight I could just get the cattle fed in 
the morning before it was time to start feeding 
them their afternoon rations. How well I 
remember getting the flu during Decembers 
cold spell, but knowing that the cattle still had 
to be fed. Wrapped to the gills, I’d go out to 
feed the cattle and then go down into the base­
ment by the furnace and shiver for awhile.
*
Shocking oats meant long, hot days of stoop­
ing over the bundles and setting up the shocks. 
Then came threshing—in my mind, the most 
overrated event in the work year (perhaps 
because in our small threshing ring the hired 
men had to haul the bundles). Elmer Lake 
owned and operated the small Red River 
Special threshing machine, powered by a big, 
o d McCormick-Deering tractor. He was a
Tractor Trouble
I
 GREW UP during the transition 
from workhorses to tractors.
In the 1930s we had a row- 
crop Farmall tractor and a big, 
clumsy John Deere. But we also 
still had several teams of hors­
es, which we used for hauling 
feed and some field work.
Queen and Daisy made a partic­
ularly good team for a green kid 
to drive.
Then when I worked as a hired 
man myself, in the 1940s, I had 
my first experience operating 
tractors. It was a challenge start­
ing the old John Deere "D ,” turn­
ing over its massive flywheel. 
Once I got it a'popping, I was 
loathe to shut it off for nearly 
any reason. We used it mainly 
for plowing, and once, without 
benefit of tractor lights, I plowed 
with it myself on a moonlit night. 
The furrows turned over so 
smoothly on those rolling hills, 
and so little steering was need­
ed as the "D” lumbered along in 
the semi-darkness that it 
seemed I was just out for a ride.
The John Deere "A” was the 
best tractor of its day, and run­
ning it gave me the satisfaction 
of getting a lot of field work 
done. One spring day during
corn-planting season I was out 
in a far field with the "A.” Mid­
afternoon an approaching storm 
out of the west showed every 
indication of being a “gully wash­
er” so I decided to harrow the 
just-planted field. I zoomed over 
on the tractor to a wide, grassy 
gulch and lined up on the harrow 
by setting my uphill brake hard. 
Suddenly I was flying through the 
air— as was the tractor. I knew I 
didn’t want that tractor landing 
on me, and I lit upon the ground 
running. The tractor landed 
upside down like an up-ended 
green bug, roaring mightily.
The tractor was hauled away 
to town as I, a humbled hired 
man, looked on. My boss. Fritz 
Brueck, and my dad were 
relieved at my escape, and little 
was said about my stupidity. Of 
course, my buddy Bob Brock did 
refer to me not as G. W.
Marshall but T. W. Marshall 
("tractor wrecker”).
There were lighter moments 
with tractors, too. For several 
spring days Curtis Iversen, Alvin 
Schultz, and I had been driving 
tractors hooked to manure 
spreaders. The layer of rich, 
leached manure in Fritz's feed
yards was stripped off, dumped 
into our spreaders with a 
hydraulic loader, hauled by trac­
tor to the fields, and spread on 
our cropland. Curtis and Alvin 
each bragged repeatedly about 
the superior power of his trac­
tor—Alvin on a small, new John 
Deere “B,” and Curtis on an old 
Farmall on steel-lugged wheels.
Fritz had warned me about the 
seriousness of a tractor break­
down in wartime. Certainly, trac­
tor pulls were forbidden. 
Nevertheless, as soon as the 
hauling was done and our boss 
had headed for town, the boys 
prepared for their tractor pull. I 
even found the log chain— so I 
was a facilitator, no less. The 
tractors were chained back-to- 
back in the barnyard near the 
gas pump. Yet in this most 
unscientific test, the slope and 
the drawbar heights could not be 
equalized. The result was that 
Curtis on the Farmall was inched 
backwards slightly downhill as 
he, by every physical contortion, 
struggled against defeat to Alvin.
I laughed so hard that I lay help­
lessly gasping for breath across 
a horizontal gas barrel.
— Gordon Marshall
154 THE PALIMPSEST
.
wise, fatherly, safety-minded boss for our gen­
erally green crew of bundle haulers.
Our teams would walk along the rows of 
shocks while we pitched the bundles onto the 
hayrack and artfully built our loads until the 
rack was full. Then we hauled the load to the 
farmstead, where the threshing machine sepa­
rated the grain from the chaff, and blew the 
straw into the barn or onto a strawstack.
We young guys soon grew tired of the grind, 
despite our sociable competitions to haul the 
biggest load—or to even just keep up. 
Fortunately the threshing dinners interrupted 
the hot workday. I would quickly unload my 
last load of the morning into the separator, 
carefully water my sweaty team at a scummy 
water trough and tie the horses in a bam, then 
head down to a cool farmhouse basement to 
wash off a coating of chaff, dirt, and sweat. 
Then I would join the gang at the long table for 
Swiss steak and mashed potatoes and gravy 
served by friendly, Hushed women. We ate 
quickly with little talk. After a dessert of 
pineapple upside-down cake, there was time 
for a brief sit in the shade of the yard for a little 
talk and kidding around. Then it was back to 
work. Trotting the team along a rough lane 
hack to the oat field. 1 stood on the rack trying 
to digest my big dinner.
A short hitch in the navy and a year at college 
intervened before I returned to our farm for 
the summer of 1947, to work for our current 
renter, Alvin Iversen. I used to show off at noon 
by leaping the backyard fence to get to dinner. 
But it was worth the leap for Lena Iversens 
cooking. She was an efficient woman who could 
finish the housework and make a sour cream 
raisin pie by noon, and play the organ at church 
all afternoon.
I remember coming back to Alvins early on 
warm Sunday nights after dull Sundays spent 
with the folks in town, not seeing pals or dat­
ing. Smoking a cigarette out on the east bal­
cony, I looked beyond the huge cottonwoods 
that bordered the front yard. I was frustrated 
that my old house was no longer home. When I 
had worked for Bruecks, I had been too busy 
and too young to reflect on that. 1 knew that I 
would have to try other kinds of summer jobs, 
away from Battle Creek. The summer of 1947 
turned out to be my farewell as a hired man.
Willa Gather summed it up best about hired 
men in her novel My Antonia. “What good fel­
lows they were, how much they knew, and how 
many things they had kept faith with!” When 
my father died in 1972, several of our former 
hired men stopped by to pay their respects to 
my mother. On our farm Dad had been a fanat­
ic about weed control, and we had cut weeds 
endlesslv even summer. Nlv brother and I now 
offered each man one of the scythes from the 
farm. Hans Schumacher and Winston 
Mortensen, who had worked several years for 
us, accepted a scythe as a treasured reminder 
of their days at “Marshall Fields." Howard 
Nielsen declined, wanting “no damn scythe.” 1 
understood both responses—that of the fellows 
who wanted to remember how hard they had 
worked, and that of the fellow who would just 
as soon forget. Q
WINTER 1993 155


Not a member yet