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Fannie L. Eisele

My job on the farm was to help out doors. The second year we bought a cow, and more cattle were bought as the years passed. As long as I was home with Father and Mother, my job was to milk the cows, churn the butter, wean the claves, and yoke the cattle to keep them from straying off as the fences were poor. At first, only one strand of barb wire was used for a fence but later two woven wires were used. For a long time, I milked from five to twelve cows every morning and night. When any cattle were sold, I rounded them up and started them out because when the buyers came, the animals would get scared and run and jump the fences ....

Brother and I worked at haying time, and in harvesting the grain. I helped haul in the hay from the meadow and stack it in the racks. One time the team ran away when we drove over a nest of bumble bees that swarmed up and stung the horses. I shocked the bundles of wheat in the field, helped scoop up grain into the wagons and haul it into the bins….

My brother, Herman, and I did the plowing.We would come in from the field in the evening at seven o'clock, and feed our horses. First, we would brush the horses and wash their shoulders. Then I milked the cows, while brother would look after the plows and get them repaired for the next day. I drove three horses on a plow. It took six weeks to finish plowing 160 acres. Besides the grain crop, we would raise corn and use the cobs to burn in the stoves at the house as well as wood. Father fed corn to his hogs and we cured our own meat.

Source: Fannie L. Eisele, We Came to Live in Oklahoma Territory, 61

 

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