HATTIE
The year was 1913. Hattie was a Nebraska farm girl about to turn 21.
Desending from the Haggarts of Clan Ross of the Scottish highlands and" Blue Bellied Yankee's" she was about to prove up on her homestead in WY..
She recalled as a child being held back and having to watch her home burn with her cats in it. Hattie also remembered her dad who was off working on the rail road bringing home a new china Platter for her Mother holding it in his lap so it wouldn't break because the wagon road was so rough. She sometimes talked of his dying when she was nine years old.
Hattie was aggravated with her big brothers for not hooking up the buggy for her when she wanted to go to Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. So, she hooked up the horse and went by herself. She told me once after that she always dreamed of owning a cabin in the pines.
Her eyes would light up when she recalled riding the Emigrant car to WY. She saw the train caboose ahead of her when coming around a horse shoe bend!
As a single young women she remembered helping butchering flocks of Turkeys with her friend Clara to be put up for winter. She and Clara cooked for the sheep shearing crews in a camp below the Hamilton Hills and slept under the stars listening to the coyotes.
As a bride she would get out of bed in the middle of the night to go out her corrals and beat the coyotes off the sheep with a club. She recalled when changing a diaper jumping on a saddle horse bare back and going after the cowboy who was stealing her milk cow calf. After discussing his pedigree with him she brought back the calf.
Hattie hated pushing the Model A up through the 77 Hills. Hattie grieved over her brother in law being bushwhacked in those same hills after a winning large at poker.
she was sad that her first fiance' died in France during WW II.
Hattie knew every word of:
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.
Take up your quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep,
Though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
She felt clever at being able figure out where her son was in the Pacific. He mentioned his rope in a letter. (Manila/hemp). I found receipts in her trunk for war bonds from both wars. A time when money was in short supply.
Hattie didn't care for sixties rock but I do recall her doing a little dance to Red Wing. The sixties were confusing to her but she was proud of two of her older Grandsons who went to Viet Nam.
Later after that war she bragged about me calling her from Okinawa when I was in the US Navy.
Hattie baked the best bread and lemon pies that I have ever eaten. Her fried chicken is untouchable.
She never wore trouser or drove a car and others described her as always a lady. She wore her best dresses and always wore a hat except in the worst of the winter when she wore a head scarf when going to town,
Hattie never had electricity or running water but every Monday we hauled water in from the back yard wind mill, heated it on the wood stove in a copper boiler and she washed clothes in a gasoline ringer washer. Sheets first Levis last.
Hattie passed away in the spring 1986 at the age 93.
I still long to visit with her after supper as she rocked in her chair and patched clothes by the stove. In the predawn hour I knew that I would wake to the sound of stove lids rattling as she built a fire for breakfast.
She was a daughter, homesteader, wife, mother,grandmaw and patriot - in short - one hellva strong woman!
HATTIE
The year was 1913. Hattie was a Nebraska farm girl about to turn 21.
Desending from the Haggarts of Clan Ross of the Scottish highlands and" Blue Bellied Yankee's" she was about to prove up on her homestead in WY..
She recalled as a child being held back and having to watch her home burn with her cats in it. Hattie also remembered her dad who was off working on the rail road bringing home a new china Platter for her Mother holding it in his lap so it wouldn't break because the wagon road was so rough. She sometimes talked of his dying when she was nine years old.
Hattie was aggravated with her big brothers for not hooking up the buggy for her when she wanted to go to Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. So, she hooked up the horse and went by herself. She told me once after that she always dreamed of owning a cabin in the pines.
Her eyes would light up when she recalled riding the Emigrant car to WY. She saw the train caboose ahead of her when coming around a horse shoe bend!
As a single young women she remembered helping butchering flocks of Turkeys with her friend Clara to be put up for winter. She and Clara cooked for the sheep shearing crews in a camp below the Hamilton Hills and slept under the stars listening to the coyotes.
As a bride she would get out of bed in the middle of the night to go out her corrals and beat the coyotes off the sheep with a club. She recalled when changing a diaper jumping on a saddle horse bare back and going after the cowboy who was stealing her milk cow calf. After discussing his pedigree with him she brought back the calf.
Hattie hated pushing the Model A up through the 77 Hills. Hattie grieved over her brother in law being bushwhacked in those same hills after a winning large at poker.
she was sad that her first fiance' died in France during WW II.
Hattie knew every word of:
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.
Take up your quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep,
Though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
She felt clever at being able figure out where her son was in the Pacific. He mentioned his rope in a letter. (Manila/hemp). I found receipts in her trunk for war bonds from both wars. A time when money was in short supply.
Hattie didn't care for sixties rock but I do recall her doing a little dance to Red Wing. The sixties were confusing to her but she was proud of two of her older Grandsons who went to Viet Nam.
Later after that war she bragged about me calling her from Okinawa when I was in the US Navy.
Hattie baked the best bread and lemon pies that I have ever eaten. Her fried chicken is untouchable.
She never wore trouser or drove a car and others described her as always a lady. She wore her best dresses and always wore a hat except in the worst of the winter when she wore a head scarf when going to town,
Hattie never had electricity or running water but every Monday we hauled water in from the back yard wind mill, heated it on the wood stove in a copper boiler and she washed clothes in a gasoline ringer washer. Sheets first Levis last.
Hattie passed away in the spring 1986 at the age 93.
I still long to visit with her after supper as she rocked in her chair and patched clothes by the stove. In the predawn hour I knew that I would wake to the sound of stove lids rattling as she built a fire for breakfast.
She was a daughter, homesteader, wife, mother,grandmaw and patriot - in short - one hellva strong woman!