Lessons Learned on the Farm
A Step Back in Time When Life Was Simpler and Family Was Celebrated
By Phyllis Porter Dolislager
With Eleanor Porter Grifhorst, Ronald Porter, Charles Porter, Darcia Porter Kelley
Smashwords Edition Copyright © 2011 by Phyllis Porter Dolislager
All rights reserved solely by the author. The author guarantees all contents are original and do not infringe upon the legal rights of any other person or work. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the author. The views expressed in this book are not necessarily those of the publisher.
Unless otherwise indicated. Bible quotations are taken from the King James Version. Copyright © 1976 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Cover photo of the Porter farm by Eleanor Porter
Readers Respond
What a delight it was to be reminded of everyday life in the 50’s and 60’s in a farming community. Maybe it DOESN’T require a “village” to raise a child…a township seems to have done the job just fine in the case of the Porter children. The contributions of extended family, neighbors, churches, teachers, doctors and friends were shown to be the treasures that they truly are in this down-to-earth memoir. I wish the children of today could experience the life of hard work, self-esteem, generosity, faith, respect and love that I read on these pages.
—A Reader
I enjoyed reading your book very much. I grew up in a farming community, but I never understood what farming was really like. Through your use of simple anecdotes, I became a part of your family— sharing in the joys, challenges, and the crises that come your way. I never had really appreciated the sacrifices and rewards of farming until I read this book. It was both nostalgic and educational.
I, of course, could most identify with your chapter on our church. That was a nice tribute you gave Dad. They were great years.
—Paul Adams
We have both read your book and enjoyed it very much. You did an excellent job of research, organizing and writing.
—Fred and Fran Bartlett
Your book tells what “family farm” will always mean to me. The work of all the members of the family, the integration of the family into the community, and the bonds with neighbors and extended family is the heart and soul of the good life we were able to experience growing up in this setting. I’m so glad to have shared the life depicted in your book. I’m delighted that you’ve been able to share this with so many.
—Ann Pratt Scott
Your book tells a great story, very special to me as my own early life in New Hampshire so closely parallels yours. It took me much longer to read than would normally be the case as every few paragraphs recalled similar memories of my own experiences—things that I had forgotten or not recalled for many, many years.
I wanted to let you know that there are benefits to writing this type of family history beyond those to your family and to your Michigan neighbors. Thanks for the memories that were rediscovered.
—Jack Smith
I was raised on a farm in South Dakota and everything I read took me home. What fun! You brought back so many great memories. I think being a farm kid was the best way in the world to grow up. Thank you for the trip down memory lane.
—Wanda Oleson Holman
How easy it is to forget where we came from and what shaped our lives. Phyllis Dolislager plows up the fields of the past and germinates in our minds and hearts the roots of upbringing and the effect it has on our lives. For so many, a life in touch with “the ground” that moved slow enough to influence an individual has eluded us. Read this and count yourself enriched or cheated…depending on your upbringing. Use the lessons to instill in your present life and the lives of those you are responsible for ways to realign with meaning.
—Dave Kendall
Your Aunt Dee gave me your book, and I really enjoyed it. I can relate to most of it as my grandparents lived on a farm in Traverse City. They had an outhouse also, but it was only a two-seater. I remember it most when it was -20 degrees, and you had to go out there before going to bed. I also enjoyed reading about the different people in your book. Being from Rockford, I knew most of them.
—Gary Edgecomb
Your book sure brought back a lot of memories. Your college age class at Oakfield was the first Sunday School class I’d ever taught. You guys had a lot of patience with me. Like the time the lesson was on “Matters for the Married.” My comment was, “None of you are married, so we’ll skip that lesson.” You and the class taught me a lesson that day when you insisted that I needed to teach it because you had plans to get married. Thank you for sharing your memories and talents with us.
—Frank Austin
What a fun excursion into my past. When my daughter comes home I will let her read your book if she wants a picture of what life was like for me growing up in Michigan.
When I go back to Rockford and people get excited about going to the Old Mill it is funny to me. I never would have dreamed that would attract people from all over Michigan. My memories were backing up to the loading dock and leaving the pickup there while Mom and I hurried all over town doing errands so we would be back to take the load of feed home after it was ground.
You didn’t mention learning to drive. The hay fields were the training grounds for all of us. I must have been about six when Dad put me on the tractor and told me to steer between the bales while they picked up the hay. The pedals were so stiff and I was so small, I couldn’t push them. If I had to stop, someone would run up and hop on behind me and push in the pedals. Later, when I was a bit older, I would grab the steering wheel, stand up on the pedals and pull against the steering wheel with all my might to force the pedals down.
I just had to take a minute and thank you for the fun your book brought. I read every line and every appendix entry and knew how very real it all was. You did a wonderful job!
—Carol Erhart Morrill
I really enjoyed reading the farm book. I devoured it in a short time, and it was great. I could identify with so much in the book. I loved every page, including your mother’s columns and the diary, the black and white floor, young people’s group, church twice on Sundays and Wednesdays, and more items too numerous to relate.
—Suzanne Kavgian
Books by Phyllis Porter Dolislager
Moved Out of Our Comfort Zone (2007) We moved…three times in twelve months!
Simple Ways to Share Your Faith (2006) Pointing People to Jesus
I Pray for You on Wednesday (2004) How to Energize Your God-Time
The Missing Part of Your Will: Your Testament (2004) How to Write an Ethical Will
Good Morning…Let the Stress Begin (2003, 2005, 2006) and other writings to encourage you to publish your stories
A King-Size Bed, A Silk Tree, and a Fry Pan (2003) and other stories of Faith, Family & Friendship
Lessons Learned on the Farm (2001, 2007) A Step Back in Time when Life was Simpler And Family was Celebrated
Dedication
In memory of our father, Darcy Porter, whose vision and work ethic truly made him a successful farmer
For our Mother, Eleanor Porter Grifhorst, who joined hands with Dad and shared his vision
For our spouses, children, and grandchildren, may you gain a perspective of our farm heritage
For the many hands and lives that touched us on the farm, thank you
For the real, unsung heroes: America’s farmers
Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Blue Light Memories
Chapter 2. On the Way to Peterson Road
Chapter 3. Hard Work and Innovation
Chapter 4. Heartbeat of the Farm Family
Chapter 5. Country School and Beyond
Chapter 6. Twice a Day—365 Days a Year .
Chapter 7. Church at the Crossroads
Chapter 9. Many Lives, Many Hands .
Chapter 10. Horse Races and Cow Tipping
Chapter 11. Crisis Without 911
Memories and Photos of Grandchildren
Selected Courtland Clippings from 1965
Department of Vocational Agriculture Diploma
You don’t have to be a millionaire to leave a legacy.
Growing up on a farm didn’t seem particularly special to any of us. We grumbled and complained like all kids about the chores that we did and because we always had to get home to milk the cows. But we accepted it; it was our way of life. We never did understand why our city cousins and friends thought it was so great.
Now that we’re adults with children and grandchildren of our own, we think it was the best thing that ever happened to us. The farm was the perfect training ground for learning the traits of success. Our parents truly were role models for us. The work was hard and getting it done right the first time was important. We didn’t waste time.
The routine of farm living taught us discipline. There was work to be done and we did it: hay to be brought into the barn, cows to milk, crops to plant, trips to make to pick up parts for a break-down, calves to feed. We saw our work yield rewards. We saw the haymow fill up. We saw the milk level in the bulk tank increase. We saw the wheat harvested and sold. We saw broken implements fixed. We saw calves grow and get moved to different pens.
Dad and Mother were ahead of their time in giving psychological rewards too. We were told that we had worked hard or had done a good job. We were given thank you’s. Whether it was picking green beans in the garden or throwing off a wagonload of hay, we knew we were appreciated.
Spiritual discipline was another large part of our lives. We had family devotions without fail. We heard our parents pray out loud. We saw Dad pray before he bought a new implement or cattle. We knew that Dad read his Bible at 3:30 a.m. before going out to milk the cows at 4:00 a.m. We saw Mother care for others less fortunate. Regularly we saw her show hospitality in our house. Our friends were always welcome, and she invited people who were role models for us. Often we had missionaries and pastors in our home.
Believing that there are valuable lessons of life and faith to be gained by examining our past, and that family history is important because the family is the fundamental unit of society, we have recorded a small portion of our family’s unique heritage of not only living on a dairy farm, but prospering as well. We learned that persistence is the face of success. We learned that hard work and integrity go hand in hand. We learned that relationships and working together paid dividends.
What we wouldn’t give to be able to spend one more day at the farm with Dad and Mother and each other. But that’s not possible. What is possible is to record our memories in the hopes that a few of the lessons we learned and the values we gained will be passed on to our children, our grandchildren, our family, our friends, and you.
The year I wrote a book for our sons and grandchildren for Christmas as a part of my Last Will and Testament, my family in Michigan kept asking if the Farm would be in it. Then they’d start regaling me with memories that I should include. Finally I promised them all that the next book would be about the farm, but I warned that they’d all have to be willing to help me.
I made my first “book trip” to Michigan in October of 2000. I had sent my siblings four pages of questions to answer. I spent three or four days with Mother going through photo albums and memorabilia that she had saved. Each day I would ask her questions about a single topic. I found that if I tried to cover more, she became too tired and would say, “Why do you want to know that?” I spent more time getting details from each of my siblings.
In the midst of going through Mother’s memorabilia, I found a Diary from 1963. (See Appendix) Although it contains a lot of personal information, there is also data that supports this book about the farm.
While I was there and staying with my sister Darcia, my niece Pamela asked, “Couldn’t you somehow add the Granddaughter and Grandson nights that we had on Eleven Mile Road?”
My first response was, “No.” I had narrowed the years to include the 50’s and 60’s, and that nicely covered the major time span of us kids growing up and that of the dairy cows. But her disappointment weighed heavily on me, and I started to think. I had planned to do an Epilogue giving a brief accounting of what the “farm kids” were doing today. So I planned then and there to have an Appendix, even if just for the Grandkids. Of course, I soon found that I’d need it for other material as well.
In the midst of writing and researching this book, Mother, at the age of 78, got her first computer and learned how to do e-mail. This was great for asking the one or two questions that held immediate interest for me. She proclaimed, “This is better than making phone calls.” It’s just another example of this amazing woman’s spirit.
Another trip to Michigan in July 2001 helped me to fill in some gaps of the farm history. I also spent time doing research in Rockford’s Historical Museum and the Grand Rapids Public Library. This time in Michigan also led me to some of the “lives” that had touched us on the farm. I believe that their contributions nicely round out this family memoir.
It’s been a nostalgic “visit” back to the 50’s and 60’s for me. During the course of writing this book I’ve grieved for Dad more than ever before. I know he would appreciate our efforts to recapture the times we had together. I truly gained a new appreciation for my parents and their vision for their lives. I understand the hard work and at times sacrifice that my brothers put into the farm. I saw all of our experiences in a new light. Kierkegaard said, “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.” And so we’ve continued on with our lives, knowing there’s not much that any of us would have changed about our past.
* * *
A special thank you to Evie Opitz and Janet Ratty for proofreading this manuscript.
Blue Light Memories
On our farm, the color blue taught us more about love than the color red. In addition, it meant Christmas and sharing the memories of Dad and Mom’s wedding. All of us could recite the story.
Dad and Mother were married in 1940 in front of a 7-foot Christmas tree with large, blue, electric lights in her parents’ farmhouse on Courtland Drive with their immediate families present. Wearing a wine, chiffon velvet dress, which cost her $8, and wine-colored pumps with glass heels, Mother walked down an open stairway as her Aunt Emily DeBoer played the piano. Grandpa DeBoer had told Mother that she couldn’t get married until her 18th birthday. Part of this had to do with the fact that Dad was five years older than Mother. (Another detail that we could recite.)
Mother’s birthday was December 10. So they waited until the 20th, a whole ten days, for the wedding. Having our parents’ wedding anniversary come during the holiday season heightened our sense of celebration. On that day, Dad would start the evening chores (milking) early. He’d come in and take a bath, and without fail they’d go into the big city, Grand Rapids. Also without fail they’d go to the exotic, Chinese restaurant on Division Ave. After that they’d walk downtown looking at the animated Christmas displays in the windows of Wurzburg’s or Herpolsheimer’s (Herps). We saw all of this as romantic and very Christmassy.
With Mother’s birthday falling on the 10th and Phyllis’s falling on the 13th, we would search and chop down our tree some time in between those dates, before anyone else in the neighborhood. In the 50’s, the trip to the woods would be made with Dad and his hand-sharpened hatchet and axe. The choice of pine trees on our farm was quite sparse; none of them would hold a candle to today’s selection. But we always thought that we brought back the best one. (Years later Dar remembers going to Hart’s Tree Farm on Young Avenue to pick out a tree.)
We don’t remember Mother ever complaining about our choice of trees. She would go about her part of directing us kids in the decorating. The lights were the larger bulbs, and for several years they were all blue. Our ornaments were glass. The final task was hanging the icicles. (1/8 inch x 12-inch strips of aluminum foil.) This job required a lot of patience. They were the prettiest if they were separated from each other and put on one at a time. We would start out with good intentions, then we’d start doing two at a time, then three, and the last handfuls were often just tossed on the tree. But how pretty it’d be with the lights reflecting all that shimmery silver.
The smell of the newly cut pine tree would permeate our house for the next two weeks. Over and over again we’d go into the living room to look at our beautiful tree and enjoy the aroma of the piney scent. To this day, walking past rows of pine trees for sale and inhaling their fragrance brings back memories of Christmas on the farm.
We had a nativity set that would be placed in some honored spot, and Christmas stockings that came out on Christmas Eve. Walking into the living room and smelling the tree before we even saw it, was a child’s delight. That was pretty much all the decorating that we did in the country in the 50’s. We didn’t have any plastic yard-art Santas, pine wreaths on the door, or outside blinking lights.
At this season the barn seemed to be more inviting also. For one thing, the body heat of all the cows made it appealing. Dad would always give the barn cats extra milk and the cows extra molasses or grain in honor of the occasion. Perhaps he was remembering the words to the Christmas Carol, “Away In A Manger.”
Some years, Mother would take us kids to downtown Grand Rapids. Then we’d get to see the action displays in the big store windows. We’d have to stand in line until it was our turn to get right up to the front. The mechanisms were simple; we would see a wooden soldier drumming on a drum and another character taking off his hat and putting it back on. If we had enough time, we might even get to stand in line to see Santa. We only remember doing this once. Mother even splurged and bought the black and white photo to commemorate the occasion. The great discussion usually was which store had the better Santa—Herps or Wurzburg’s.
Downtown Grand Rapids was like a foreign country to us country kids. We saw lights and displays and people dressed up like we’d never seen before. (People wore their Sunday best clothes when they went to Grand Rapids.) It was also us kids’ first time to see a black person. We remember Mother warning us not to stare or point if we saw someone; it wasn’t polite. (Of course, Phyllis knew all about that from having polio and people commenting on her limping and/or leg brace.) If it was nighttime, we’d drive through East Grand Rapids where the rich people lived. They even decorated the outside of their houses with lights! We’d ohh and ahh and be thrilled to death. Grand Rapids was the ultimate, holiday destination. Chuck remembers thinking as a child that when he grew up he wasn’t going to be a farmer; he was going to live in East Grand Rapids.
If we were real lucky, we’d get enough snow so that the roads were covered with a thick, icy base. And one morning, as we were getting ready for school, we’d be surprised out of our boots by the sound of bells. It’d be Dayton Hammer, with his team of horses and a sleigh filled with clean straw to sit on and blankets to keep us warm, waiting in the road to take us to school. This happened only once or twice, but it filled our minds with storybook memories. We didn’t even mind picking the straw off our woolen hats and hand-knitted mittens after our sleigh ride. (Chuck remembers Dayton also giving summertime hay wagon rides with the horses.) Dayton kept his horses long after he transitioned to a tractor.
The closer it got to Christmas the more excited we’d get. Mother kept packages hidden in her closet. And of course, we were admonished that if we didn’t behave, all we’d get would be a bag of salt or a lump of coal in our stocking. We were told “real stories” about “real children” getting the dreaded lump of coal as their only present. We became model children for those weeks, gladly volunteering without being told.
Gift exchange was always on Christmas Eve. We’d get Dad things like socks and ties and supposedly his favorite, Chocolate Covered Cherries. He’d carefully open the cellophane wrapping, take off the lid, and pass them around for us all to sample. We thought they were just the best things. For Mother we’d get aprons and Evening in Paris perfume. We’d also get her handkerchiefs, as there was no such thing as Kleenex then. To this day, Mother still carries hankies.
The best Christmas Phyllis remembers is after she and Ron had opened their gifts, and they were told to get ready for bed because it was late. As they walked into the kitchen, there were two sleds! They were overwhelmed, as they thought they’d received all they could expect. Phyllis’s sled was longer than Ron’s as she was taller. They were the legendary, good ol’ Radio Flyers. These fabled, speed machines had bright red, steerable, metal runners and varnished wooden slats to ride on. Morning didn’t arrive soon enough.
Darcia’s best gift was a big doll that she had seen at Harvard Grocery. She really wanted it. Mother told her that someone else bought it, but she did. She hid it and had it wrapped and under the tree to surprise Dar. Another favorite gift was her Barbie Dream House.
Chuck remembers getting softball and baseball gloves, and Ron remembers one time driving home from church when Mother and Dad were pointing out the hoof prints in the snow. That was quite convincing. That year we had to sit in the car while Dad went up to the attic and put Ron’s red 20-inch bicycle by the tree.
After opening our gifts, we’d look hard for the longest stocking (our actual socks) to put out for Santa to fill. Usually we’d end up borrowing from Dad because his were bigger. We never supposed that there really was a Santa Claus, but on Christmas Eve we became believers. Each year we’d also leave a snack for Santa—usually fresh cow’s milk and homemade, chocolate chip cookies. And sure enough, the next morning our stockings would be filled and the snack eaten.
At the very toe of each stocking would be an orange that fit with ease thanks to Dad’s big feet. Fruit in the wintertime was a rare treat. There would also be lifesavers and gum. Christmas Day we’d go to Grandma and Grandpa DeBoer’s house for a big Christmas dinner followed by Dad’s favorite pie, mince meat, (before time took the meat out of mince meat pie) and Phyllis’s favorite, pineapple pie.
The day after Christmas, we’d remove the ornaments and the blue lights from the Christmas tree, even salvaging the icicles to use another year. We’d put the decorations in a special, round, thin wood, covered container and store it in the attic. But the memories of the season were with us year-round. We’d sometimes envy those who had their tree up until New Year’s, but we knew that our way of doing it really was the best!
Maybe that’s what makes our farm history worthy of note: we didn’t necessarily follow the norm of the day. Dad was not only an innovator in his farming methods, but active in community service as well. Even when it came to being people of faith, we jumped in with both feet. We didn’t do anything halfway or half-heartedly.
June 1942
Wedding announcement Rockford Register December, 1940
1973 and Mother still fit into her wedding dress. She wore it for the Mother-Daughter Wedding Dress Style Show. It was the oldest dress there.
Dayton Hammer bringing us home from school with his horses and sleigh, 1951 Wurzburg’s 1949
On the Way to Peterson Road
We always thought the story of how Mother (Eleanor) and Dad (Darcy) met was adventuresome and romantic. (It, too, was a story that we could all recite.) A group of young people had been playing ball on a Sunday afternoon and decided to go for a ride to Fisk Nob, the fire tower and the tallest place in the area. Apparently Darcy had been flirting with Eleanor and it continued while they were in the car. Once they reached their destination and started to climb up the tower, Darcy and Eleanor raced to the top and were the first ones up. He kissed her up there and asked her to go see a movie that night. The genesis of the Porter zeal had begun.
Darcy was 23 when he married Eleanor, so he had more years to date. One Saturday night Eleanor was standing on one of the four corners of downtown Rockford by the drug store, and she saw Darcy drive by. She waved, and he waved. However, there was another girl standing on the opposite corner, and she too thought Darcy had waved at her. He drove back around and picked up the other girl. Eleanor wrote him a letter after that incident, and apparently that convinced him that he’d picked up the wrong girl. The rest is history.
During their courtship, Darcy worked the second shift at Federal Mogul and also owned and operated a gas station on the corner of M-57 and US-131. He had a punchboard there that people could pay $.10/punch and see what prize, if any, they won. When it’d get down to the last 1/4 and no one had won the pound box of chocolates, he’d punch the remainder out himself. One day he drove in, and Eleanor was all excited to see that he’d brought her candy, but it was for her mother. Smooth operator, our father.
Darcy spent his childhood as one of seven children living the fulfilling lifestyle of a Kent County farm family. During high school at Rockford, Darcy played football, excelled in chemistry, and won the senior Citizen Award. Because of his good grades, he was in line to receive a scholarship to attend college. But at the last moment, some politics came into play, and the scholarship was given to another. This was a big disappointment in his life.
Eleanor was born and grew up in Rockford. Her father worked at Wolverine doing piecework as a nailer of shoes. She started playing the violin in the sixth grade and played in the high school orchestra. Eleanor followed a business curriculum and graduated from Rockford High School. They purposely kept her diploma to hand out last at graduation because she was the first one to have a job after graduation. Six months later, at the time of her marriage, she received a hand-written letter from Otto Krause, owner of Wolverine Shoe & Tanning Corporation, wishing her happiness in her marriage. (See Appendix)
After their wedding ceremony, they found their car jacked up and in a snow bank, some family member’s practical joke. The newlyweds never learned who had been busy. They had to get help to get it out and going.
When Darcy and Eleanor were finally in the car and headed to Grand Rapids, they realized that they had forgotten to pay the preacher, Rev. Nathaniel Chew of Courtland Methodist. So they turned around and took him the $5.00. He then gave them a gift that he’d also “forgotten.” After all of that, they decided to go stay in the house that they’d rented ($12/month) on 11 Mile Road.
The following month, Eleanor was surprised and upset when a statement came in the mail for the new suit, hat, and overcoat that Darcy had charged for the wedding. They were also committed to a payment of $12/month towards their furniture—total of $246.58. They stayed in that house only three months—they were frozen out. The snow came in around the windows and right through the wall; there was a drift in their bedroom. Even with a furnace and space heater, they couldn’t keep warm. It was with some sadness that they went to live with Eleanor’s parents, as they had painted and papered the whole downstairs of the house for one month’s rent.
Later that year they bought a house in Rockford on Ogden Street. It was only nine months old, and they paid $2,000 for it. Eleanor’s father, John DeBoer, co-signed the note. At this point in time, food rationing, because of the War in Europe, was only a rumor, but Darcy bought 100 pounds of sugar for baking and canning and put it under their bed.
Phyllis Kay was born December 13, 1941 in Grand Rapids, six days after Pearl Harbor was attacked by Japan making America a part of World War II. (She was named for Eleanor’s friend, Phyllis Hardy, and Darcy’s niece Kay Miller, and was often called PK.) Darcy was so excited that he gave the doctor a foot-long cigar. Eleanor had had her appendix taken out when she was four months pregnant. (That was before the time of ultrasound. The doctor just poised his knife and made an incision—and fortunately, out popped the appendix. Eleanor ended up with only a one-inch incision.) Darcy was rejoicing that there was a live birth—hence the cigar.
Eleanor and baby stayed in the hospital for ten days, and the bill was less than a hundred dollars. But Phyllis Kay’s claim to fame was that she had so many living grandparents that there was an article in the newspaper. There were ten! More than one of these grandparents counted all of her fingers and toes when she was born because Darcy and Eleanor were distant cousins. But the only anomaly that we’ve found is that none of us, except Ron, got our wisdom teeth.
Because of gas rationing, Darcy and Eleanor only lived in their Rockford home for six months. When Phyllis was three weeks old, they moved to Greenville so Darcy could be closer to work. He had been riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle to work. They rented out the Rockford house.
In Greenville, they rented a house at 211 E. Grove St. A couple of months after they moved in, a big, snowstorm came and a neighbor, a retired dentist with Alzheimer’s, wandered away from home. His wife came to Eleanor and told her that Mr. Stevensen had run away. So she watched Phyllis, and Eleanor went to look for him. People were all about, including street cleaners that were hauling the snow away.
Eleanor found him on Main Street by the J.C. Penney Store. He had wandered five blocks, barefoot, wearing only his long-legged underwear. She took him by the arm and told him, “Mr. Stevensen, you’ve got to go back home,” and she led him down Main Street. He never as much as got a cold, but being a proper woman, Eleanor was red with embarrassment, walking down Main Street with an old man in his underwear.
They stayed there a year and then moved to Orange Street where they rented until 1944. It was while living there that Phyllis Kay contracted polio when she was 18 months old. They guessed that she might have gotten it from a lake because the family had spent a lot of time at the local lakes that summer.
The first sign Eleanor noticed was that Phyllis Kay walked with a limp. She took her to see their family doctor, Marco Hansen, and he referred them to a specialist in Grand Rapids, but he told her to take her daughter home—she had only bumped her leg! Apparently polio was on the minds of all the mothers, and for any slight problem they were having their children examined.
Time went on, and one day Phyllis fell; her leg could no longer hold her. This time Eleanor took her to a polio specialist at Blodgett Hospital. Darcy and Eleanor carried her around from approximately the age of two to four. She got a leg brace before starting kindergarten at Horton School. One time they stopped at Ramona Park on the way home from the hospital. Phyllis wanted to ride the merry-go-round, but it wasn’t open. When the man saw her brace, he started the hand-painted, wooden horses going just for her and gave her the longest ride ever!
This was the time of World War II, and after getting his physical, Darcy received the draft classification of 1A. When he told his employer, Federal Mogul, who made bearings for engines, they got it switched to 2A. This was one of his lifetime disappointments, that of not having the opportunity of serving his country as a member of the armed forces. But during the period of World War II, the Greenville plant was involved in wartime production, and his service there was considered to be most important. Perhaps this was the reason for his untiring and constant government service and community involvement throughout the rest of his life.
Darcy had 100 women working for him. He was given the nickname of “Doc” because he fixed the equipment and kept things going. He started as a set up man and became a foreman. Before he left to farm, he was Assistant Superintendent.
One day, word reached the plant that nylon stockings (These were thigh-high and held up with a garter belt.) were available in town at one of the department stores. There was a one-pair limit. Being a romantic, Darcy stood in line to buy Eleanor a pair, as she didn’t have any. Nylons were one of the things that women did without during the War.
In 1944 Darcy and Eleanor decided that what they really wanted to do was to be farmers. Darcy had always said that farming was “in his blood,” but he didn’t want to be poor like his folks. Eleanor’s goal had always been to be a farmer’s wife. They bought their first farm on M-57, just west of the Half Way Store (half way between Greenville and US-131). It had 90 acres and they paid $3,700. The barn was on the north side of the road, and the house was on the south side bordering the north shore of Angel Lake.
Many arrowheads were found around that lake; they would even turn up during plowing. The Indians came from Wabasis Lake, four or five miles away, to this hunting ground around the lake. At the northeast side of the lake was a cranberry bog. Darcy and Eleanor would have to get into a rowboat to pick the berries. Relatives would come out from Rockford and Grand Rapids to join in the harvest.
Darcy continued to work at Federal Mogul, as they started out with four or five cows. They farmed with a team of black workhorses, Jack and Jerry. These horses mowed hay, plowed, planted, and pulled wagons. When it worked, a Doodlebug, a “make shift” tractor from car parts, was also put to work.
Rationing was in effect, and Eleanor had to cook on a wood-burning, kitchen range. She said, “I couldn’t hook up the stove because the farmhouse wasn’t wired for a stove. It was wartime, you couldn’t get it done. We waited over a year to get an electric water pump. It required a special permit. I had to build a fire in the old range to even make a cup of coffee. The good old days—actually I enjoyed them. Every so often I get homesick for the range. They were dirty, but nice.”
They all took baths in a galvanized tub in front of the stove with the oven door open. It was at this time that George Larsen, an old bachelor, came to live with them and to help on the farm. He had become set in his ways, but Eleanor made him change one of them. She made him take a bath once a week. He was mad; he used to take one only once a year.
Eleanor became a farm wife learning to do things like churning butter, (Grandma Porter gave her a 5-gallon butter churn with a wooden paddle.) canning lard, beef, pork, liver, and even honey. After seeing swarms of bees, Darcy took some of the siding off the side of the house and found it filled with honeycomb.
Eleanor also had a roadside stand where she sold watermelons, sweet corn, and tomatoes from the garden. She bought a fur coat with the proceeds, but when they started going to church, she put an ad in the Grand Rapids Press and sold it because she thought it was too showy.
During this time Phyllis had to lie in bed with her foot in a box so that the sheet wouldn’t touch her foot. Apparently this theory went along with not wanting her to put any weight on her foot. She remembers lying flat on her back watching spiral-cut paper placed on a stick on the heat register spin around. George did that to entertain her.
Fordyce Hough stopped by with a church bus, and Darcy carried Phyllis to the bus to attend Sunday school at Oakfield Chapel. He told Eleanor that he felt foolish having someone else taking his daughter to church, and it wasn’t long before Darcy and Eleanor started attending too. Rev. Hollis Tiffany was the pastor then.
Eleanor had been leaving spiritual things around for Darcy to read while he waited for his ride (men from Cedar Springs) to work. Evidently it worked, as he wrote in his Bible: “How do I know I am saved? Because I was there! Mother asked me to just believe! I did. Winter of 1947-48.” In 1948, under Rev. Hollis Tiffany, a large frame church was given to the members, and they moved it to its present site on the corner of Wabasis Ave. and 14 Mile Road. One Sunday morning when Rev. Tiffany was shaking hands with Eleanor, he asked if she’d been painting the barn lately because of her red nail polish. She found that amusing.
In the spring, Eleanor was out raking the lawn and putting the leaves in the garden as she burned them. The wind caught the flames and blew the fire east, all the way to Wabasis Road (1 1/2 miles away)—taking a haystack on the way. Swovelands, neighbors to the east, moved the furniture out of their house, believing it was all going to burn. Eleanor made Phyllis stand on the porch while she went out to the road, M-57, to flag down help. Two men stopped, but when they saw the fire, they drove on. Later an official from the county came and did not fine her because she had been denied help by the men.
Another enterprising venture of Eleanor and Evelyn Nicholson was to buy used nylon parachutes from a Michigan Farmer magazine ad. Together they each made a nylon blouse out of the fabric and wore them to church on Easter Sunday.
Mother was in the hospital, on oxygen, with pneumonia three weeks before Ron was born, including New Year’s Eve of 1945. She remembers hearing the church bells ring. She did get well enough to return home. Later when she was leaving for the hospital to have Ron, George told her to be sure and bring back a “hired man.” Darcy and Eleanor first took Phyllis to Darcy’s sister Crystal in Rockford and then drove back to the hospital in Greenville for Ronald Darcy’s birth, January 20, 1946. They were happy to welcome a son into the family. Eleanor and baby stayed in the hospital 10 days. Darcy continued his giving of nicknames, and Ron’s later became Skip Dip on the Whip.
1946 was also the year that after a wait of 18 months, they got a new car, a 1946 green Dodge. Darcy had said if the car was green, he wouldn’t take it, but he changed his mind. They only enjoyed this car for a year because later they traded it for a new Co-Op tractor.
“The decision to quit Federal Mogul and become full-time farmers was a bold step,” said Aaron, Dad’s brother, “especially after the war and the depression.” Federal Mogul worked hard to get him to change his mind, but in 1948, Darcy and Eleanor purchased 120 acres on Peterson Road, between Ramsdell and Myers Lake Road, for $11,000. (Owning a 120-acre farm was especially good as the average farm then was only 80 acres.) After meeting and talking with Mr. Gould, Darcy and Eleanor went into a field west of the house, across from the “sheep barns,” and prayed. They decided on a price to offer, and he accepted it.
Payments were set at $30/month. Mr. Gould told them to not make them too high and over extend themselves. He also accepted the contracts from the farm on M-57 as a down payment. (They had divided the farm into parcels and sold them on land contracts.)
The white farmhouse with a tin roof on Peterson Road had sat empty for 12 years. It came with an outhouse, a wood-burning kitchen range, a windmill with a gravity tank above the sink for water supply, a pantry with beautiful glass doors, and two oriental rugs.
Phyllis thought the outhouse was the neatest, fanciest thing because it had five holes: two big holes, one medium-sized hole, and two little holes. The three larger holes were in a row, and the two littlest holes were lower and perpendicular to the other three. She thought this was so the whole family could use it at the same time, but they never did! Outhouses were a part of our lives. Not only did we have one at home, but two at our country school—boys and girls.
These buildings were also of interest to us because later Dad and Mother would recite stories to us of pushing them over on Halloween!! One night, before they were married, three couples, Dad and Mother, Arlene Steinke and her boyfriend, and Althea and John Luyk (sister-in-law Bev’s parents) pushed over five! Dad and his guy friends would also put rolls of red, snow fence (made of wooden slats connected by strands of wire) on their cars and let it unroll down the Main Street of Cedar Springs.
It was May when the family moved to the farm that was to be their home for the next thirty-seven years. Only four months later they faced their first, big challenge.
The day they finished planting wheat, Mother had taken Howard, a hired man who had been helping them, back to Grandpa and Grandma DeBoer’s where he was staying. Phyllis and Ron were with her as she went to the mill at Porter Hollow to buy buckwheat pancake flour. (She might have spent time looking at the fabric of the feedbags also. She used them to make dresses. Usually a simple Aline dress could be made out of two feedbags. They were all colors with either a small print or flowers.) Dad’s grandfather, George Porter, had owned the mill. Even though it had burned two times, he always rebuilt it. The last time he had been 80 years old.
As they returned home and approached the farm, there were cars lined up on both sides of the road like an auction was going on. As they got closer, they could see smoke. Mother stopped the car and left Phyllis & Ron with an unknown lady, later found to be Arlene Cavanaugh, a neighbor who had also just moved to Peterson Street. Mother told her, “That’s my house on fire; please take my children.”
As Mother drove in the driveway she saw men carrying furniture out. She ran into the house, but the firemen made her leave. They thought that the roof would collapse. Dayton Hammer had used his loader tractor to get the piano out the front door and down the porch steps. (The chipped front steps were a constant reminder and remain to this day.) A passer-by had stopped to tell Dad that the house was on fire. His first reaction had been to throw two pails of milk on the fire as he had been on his way to the milk house. Ralph Pratt and other neighbor men filled milk cans with water and brought them on a trailer to pour on the fire.
The back of the house was all gone. The Fire Department thought the electrical wiring that ran up the wall was the cause. It was an old Delco Lighting System. The chamber pot was left in Phyllis’s room—no one had bothered to remove it. After the fire was put out, the power was gone. Uncle Aaron remembers helping Dad finish milking the cows by hand.
Dad and Mother spent that night at Dayton and Dorcas Hammer’s. (While there, Mother realized that she had lost her wedding ring. The next morning everyone formed a line walking from the house to the barn, and the ring was found!) Ron and Phyllis went to Grandma DeBoer’s. Darcy’s brothers, Arthur and Aaron, stayed in a car overnight at the farm to make sure the fire was out. The next day Mother’s Uncle Gary DeBoer brought them a house trailer.
When Ron returned to the farm the next day, he sat on the steps and said, “My mommy’s house burned.” Our family of four lived in the trailer for a couple of months. Mother even fed silo fillers (neighbors and hired hands) in the granary in the top of the barn during that time.
We moved into the front of the house while the back was being finished. Dad and Mother declared their first challenge to be a blessing as they ended up with just enough insurance money, $3,000, to modernize the house. We got a bathroom, a new kitchen, running water, and new electrical wiring. The rest of the house was all re-plastered. The ceilings in the dining room and living room were “sculptured” with rounded corners.
It had truly been a year of highs and lows. Before Christmas, Dad and Mother were finally settled in and well on their way to being “real” farmers and a part of their new community. The Porter zeal had been tested, but it was with anticipation that they looked to the next year and a new era for the family on Peterson Road.
Mother in high school
Top: Dad with fox, 1941; Bottom: First home bought in Rockford for $2,000 in 1941
Top: Farmhouse on M-57 Bought 90-acre farm for $3,700 in 1944
Bottom: Phyllis in galvanized tub on M-57
Top: Darcy, Eleanor and Phyllis on M-57 farm
Bottom: Darcy and Eleanor at Belle Isle, 1945
Easter Sunday 1946 Ron is 3 months old
Top: Barn on Peterson Road, Co-op E3, 1947
Bottom: Mother with Phyllis and Ron. Phyllis in her braces.
Hard Work and Innovation
Farming, some people say, is the same as gambling. When you plant the seed, you gamble on the price at harvest time. You gamble on whether or not there will be enough sunshine to bring your crop to maturity. You gamble on whether there will be enough rain. You gamble that you’ll be able to keep your equipment in good repair, and whether you’ll be able to hire the extra hands that will be needed for the harvest.
Basically, it’s you against Mother Nature. In the spring we prayed for the snow to dissipate and the fields to dry out enough to plant. The day after we finished planting, we prayed for rain so the seed would germinate. When we applied atrazine to the corn, we did want rain to get it into the soil, and on and on it went.
We wanted rain, and then we didn’t want rain—especially if we had a hay crop to bring in. In the fall, the rain would be good for the winter wheat, but interfered with harvesting the corn. And we wanted the corn harvested by Thanksgiving.
The only months that we were free from this weather worry were December through March. Then the cycle would begin all over. It was a topic that consumed us: the weather. Even if there was hay ready to bale and rain predicted for Monday, Dad never worked on Sundays,
On a hot day in June as we brought in the first cutting of hay, Dad would say, “This weather is perfect.” None of us agreed, but we didn’t say a word. Dad would also say that his father or grandfather used to say, “Dry weather—everyone eats; wet weather—everyone looks for something to eat,” and “Dry weather you worry to death; wet weather you starve to death.”
On a hot, steamy day in July, he would say, “Today you can hear the corn grow.” Grandpa Porter used to say that the corn crop should be knee-high by the Fourth of July and shoulder-high by August. But with the hybrid seed that we used, that saying became out-dated. We wanted our corn to be shoulder-high by the Fourth of July and to have tassels by August.
One year, around 1971, we were facing drought conditions. The crops were on the verge of dying in the fields, and the topic of rain totally consumed us. There’s always someone willing to take advantage of a desperate situation, and this was no exception. A man made the rounds of the neighboring farmers with his plan to seed the clouds as they came across Lake Michigan with silver iodide, thereby causing it to rain over our farms. He wanted something like $200 from each farmer. Dad was innovative in his farming methods, and this was one idea that he and the others participated in. It must be that the rain finally did come, as we don’t remember a year that we experienced a total crop loss.
Dad was always looking for new and better ways to farm and was often a leader with his practices. As early as 1948-49, we have record of him attending classes sponsored by the Department of Vocational Agriculture. (See Appendix) These classes were held at the old Rockford Public School Building on North Main Street. They were for adult farmers in the area with 15 meetings, once a week from 8 to 10 p.m. in the winter. That year the topic was Dairy Farming; other years the topics were Soils, Crops, Livestock, Farm Management and Income Tax.
Fred Bartlett, who taught agriculture to the day school students at Rockford High School, taught portions of the adult classes. (In the 1960’s Mr. Bartlett was the Agriculture teacher and FFA (Future Farmers of America) sponsor for Ron and Chuck at high school.)
Outside speakers, including some from Michigan State College, and Dr. Byram, the local veterinarian, presented some of the topics.
In the 1948-49 course on Dairy, 58 different farmers attended. Other neighbors in attendance were Joe Carlson and Dayton Hammer.
A few years later Dad started putting atrazine on corn so he didn’t have to cultivate it so many times. They used to cultivate three times. He also tried disking instead of plowing.
One innovation that Dad put into practice was Strip Crops. This was first done on the 80-acre Holland Farm on 12 Mile Road that he bought. (In the following years, the timber that Dad sold off the farm almost paid for the entire farm.) He planted strips of wheat and corn about 90 feet wide. Not only was it good for the soil to have the crops rotated, but also it was a beautiful sight to see the contrasting colors alternating across the fields. Sometimes hay would be one of the strips. This idea came from the Extension Services of Michigan State and was implemented in 1957 or 58.
Planting on the furrow was a process that ended up being a big time saver, but in the beginning, Dad wasn’t too sure how successful it would be. In fact, he used the field beyond the pond, (2nd or 3rd field) west of the road for his experiment. This way it wouldn’t show from the road if it didn’t look good. He wasn’t the only one who watched the progress of this innovation. Often Ralph and Glenn Pratt would stop and go back to look at the field with Dad. The next year, others started using the procedure.
When Dad first started farming, there was a lengthy sequence he followed to prepare the fields. He’d start by disking and then he’d plow the field using a 2-bottom plow. Dragging and then planting and fertilizing followed this. Once the crop was up, he’d cultivate the field to keep the weeds down. This could involve up to five or six steps. Before Chuck and Dar were born, Mother would help him. She would drive the Co-op and Dad used the Farm-All H. They planted about 40 to 50 acres of corn in those first years.
The idea for this new process called “planting on the furrow” came from Michigan State. At first it was only three steps: disk the field, plow the field, and plant on the furrow. The idea was that the weeds wouldn’t come up as fast, as they had been plowed completely under the furrow. This required major modifications made to the tractor. They narrowed the tractor tires to make them as close to the seat as possible. Reversing them did this. They took the fenders completely off. This process would take 2 1/2 hours.
We must mention that it was a big day when Dad purchased a 3-bottom plow—probably in the late 50’s. (When he retired in 1984 he was using a 5-bottom plow and raising about 350 acres of corn.)
The cycle started with planting, and harvesting was the pay off for all of the hard work and innovation. It was also a lot of hard work in the hottest weather. As soon as the planting was done, the first cutting of hay would be ready to cut. In the 50’s this was a lengthy process. First, the hay would be cut down using a mower with a six-foot cutter bar pulled by the tractor. Then they used a hay rake; this was a huge spinning disk with 6” tines that put the hay into rows. Then it would have to dry. If it rained or if it was heavy hay, it would have to be raked (rolled over) again. Then the baler would pack the hay into square bales and automatically tie it up with twine. The finished bales would fall onto the ground. A tractor pulling a wagon would come by. With a man on either side of the wagon, the bales would be lifted up to the man on the wagon. (Later the wagon was hooked behind the baler, and a chute sent the bales to the wagon.) This man would be responsible for stacking them tightly on the wagon, so the whole load wouldn’t tip off on its way home.
One time Ron and Chuck were taking about 200 bales of hay to sell to a farmer in Ravenna. They only got as far as 13 Mile Road and 1/3 of the load fell over. They restacked it and continued on getting just west of Sparta, and off it fell again. The last time they were close to Ravenna when the bales came off once more. This time Ron and Chuck gave up, called the man, and he came and got the spilled ones. Probably the bales weren’t baled tight enough, making them difficult to stack.
Once the wagon of hay got to the barn, someone would have to throw the bales off the wagon to the people working in the haymow. Once again they had to be stacked in the barn just so. One reason was to get as much hay as possible in, and the other reason was so it wouldn’t collapse and smother someone, or so people wouldn’t fall through the gaps and get stuck. Quite a frightening thought if one was in anyway claustrophobic. (Chuck credits Ron with teaching him how to stack hay in the barn.)