Al's Oral History

I went to school eight years. I was graduated from the 8th grade and that was in the 30's. Financially we were in bad shape and decided to work and hopefully it would get better. But instead of getting better it got worse! So in 1934 I signed up for the CCC and it's so long ago, basically I can't tell you the definition of it. But what it amounts to you worked for – in these camps and you got your board and room and $5 a month and clothing. The parents got $22.50. I will start from the beginning. I signed up in Hoxie. The sheriff furnished transportation for myself and two other boys (I don't remember their names) and took us to Atwood, Kansas where there was an established CCC Camp. We were checked out physically, stayed overnight then put on a truck to Colby and then on a train to Oakley, wound up in Junction City. There were approximately 1,000 boys there. They gathered them up and made companies of approximately 40 or 50 boys and they were sent by train to a camp. It could be a new one or one that was established or evacuated by another group of CCC boys. To give you some idea what things we did in Junction City, we slept in tents 12 beds to a tent. Our mess hall was approximately 100 - 200 feet long, 50 feet wide and had tables in it. You always had to go through chow line with mess kits. And showers that were also a tent and about 200 feet long 40 - 50 feet wide. There would be three or four strings of pipe. We would all get in it, take our clothes off and have a great time. That is the way we took a shower. We had outdoor facilities as far as latrines. It was a common thing to see bugs crawl all over them. We tolerated that. It would take approximately two weeks to make up a company and in the meantime they would have to find some work for us to do. One of the first jobs I had was to pick sandburs off of an officers' golf course there at Fort Riley. I didn't go too much for that. But in the meantime I got a job to help in the kitchen and I got along reasonably well with that because I got all I wanted to eat. But that got a bit tiresome, too. Then there was a call for some volunteers to go Major Rice's home to do some work in the house. They picked on boys that had fairly decent clothes. In spite of the fact that we were hard up I did have dress clothes and oxfords and stuff like that. Where most of the boys that came in all they had was patched overalls and denim shirts and worn out shoes at that time. So there were three of us that got to go. We had to take our shoes off when we entered the front door. To start with we had to sand floors. But the people were real nice; the lady of the house treated us real nice. We had refreshments, anything we wanted. After we sanded the floors, we varnished and polished them and we were kind of sorry to leave. But the company was gathered up. It would take a whole train of strictly CC personnel and equipment. They would have a box car just a plain old common box car that is what they would use for a kitchen. I don't recall for sure what they had to cook with, but I do know that usually the scrambled eggs we got would run all over the plate and things like that. It took about two nights, two days, and four o'clock the following morning we wound up close by Schley, Minnesota. To give you some idea where we were situated, it was ten miles from Cass Lake. The closest place that had a hospital was 70 miles. We were 70 miles from the Canadian border. Nothing but trees, beautiful country, a lot of lakes and along side of an Indian Reservation. When we left Kansas it was August and you can imagine in the 30's how hot it was then. We looked out that morning and there was frost on the trucks and the vehicles and there was no if's, and's or but's about it, you had to unload this stuff at four o'clock in the morning. I would up in barracks number 5. The camp was officially run by Army officers, but the work detail was controlled by forest rangers, they were our boss. Well anyway, to start with I almost froze to death. I didn't like that too well. We had various work details. Some would plant trees and they would take a group of five or six boys, give them rifles and ammunition. It was their job to go out and hunt all day long, take lunch with them and shoot porcupines and rabbits. The reason for that was they would eat these little trees that were planted. We planted on land that was burned out, just acres and acres of it. There was a rice detail that was a seasonal thing. We had one construction crew. But the interesting part about it was that we signed up for various jobs. Well, I would say that better than 90% of them were truck drivers, which was something that was interesting from the standpoint that most of those kids never had driven a car. Most of them came from the city and had never had the opportunity to drive a vehicle, but they all wanted to drive a truck. I did know how to drive a truck or car either one and I got the job, too. I drove an open dump truck. And in that country they could work all of the time. It was sandy, regardless of the weather condition you know it could drizzle all day long and you could still work. I got a bad cold and I told the foreman that I wanted the ranger to get me a different job. I just couldn't take it. Before they put you in the hospital you had to be almost dead. At least that is what we thought. But he did get me a different job. I got to push a wheelbarrow of cement. Thank the Lord the job didn't last too long. It would have killed me I think. Then I got a job on hunting detail. That was interesting to start with and I liked to hunt, did a lot of it. But once it was a job it got to the point where it was work, that's what it amounted to. Cut logs to no end. We piled up logs for the winter oh just taking a guess I would say a city block square and piled it 25 feet high for heating purposes. And our stoves are made out of oil drums. When they burned out they just replaced it with another one. For our entertainment they would take us to Cass Lake that was the closest theatre. And they had several dance halls. The CC camps had been there long enough to where some of the people were smart enough to figure out to get the CCC boy's money. Percentage wise there was very few white girls and those that were there were kind of particular who they wanted to associate with. They just wanted to dance with the officers. But Indians were plentiful and we got along real well. I will say one thing for the Indian girls, they could really dance. We had a lot of good times.

After the time ran out, I could have signed up again, but in the meantime they started construction on a highway south of Hoxie. My Dad arranged it so that I could get a job so I came home and drove dump truck. I never got the opportunity to go back to school and the fact that I didn't, I think that the CCC camp did me a tremendous amount of good from the standpoint that I was a grassy-green kid when I left the farm and being around a bunch of boys like that taught me how to socialize and get along with other fellows and stand up for my rights. In other words I knew how to live away from home and I thought that was worth a lot. I rented a half section of ground and planted it to wheat. The first crop I had was in 1936 and the job ended in 1936. I got approximately 25 bushels an acre and wheat was about $1.25 a bushel at that time. You could buy the best automobile, oh not the best but a Chevrolet or a Ford for between five and six hundred dollars. That wasn't such a bad deal really. But in the meatime, we got married and rented another farm. We had a 1929 model John Deere tractor that we bought for $125 and used horse machinery behind the tractor. We couldn't afford to buy the plows and drills. But I had a total failure the following year. So the wife and Joann, she was the little one, stayed with her parents and I went to Nebraska to pick corn. I had about $100 left after I paid all of the bills. We had about three cows and some chickens and that is what we lived on the rest of the winter. And we didn't stay at home. We went places. We bought gasoline for ten, eleven cents a gallon. We didn't have any house rent to pay. Kerosene light, a coal and wood stove. I cut most of the wood by hand. In 1938 we had a fair crop. That farm was sold, so I rented another farm and the owner went through foreclosure so we moved three times in one year. We made up our mind then that if we were going to move - it would either be to the city go get a job or buy a farm of our own. Can you imagine a young fellow my age going into a bank and asking the banker about buying land? I asked, who do I see to buy a farm? I heard they were available with very little down payment. It was A. M. Shatzell, who was the president of the bank at that time and he said well come and see me. I couldn't believe this man was serious, but he was. He had two farms to pick from. The one we live on now and another one east of us. It was $20 an acre and required $700 down payment. We bought it the 20th of June, 1942. I didn't have much but I didn't have any debts either. I had livestock that I had gathered up and he wouldn't even take that as collateral. Approximately 18 months later, we had enough money to pay for the half section that we live on now. We were right proud of ourselves. And then of course times got better. We had some rough times. We got hailed out about three times in five years. total loss, wiped us out completely. We had milk cows. We had an old shabby barn that you could throw a cat out anywhere without opening the door. In 1948 we built a nice barn so that we could milk. We milked about two years and decided it was a hard way to make a living. We quit that. I don't know what else would be of interest. In 1947 I bought a section for $40 an acre and in 1959 I bought a half section for $106 an acre. That is the extent of the land buying. but in the meantime land has gone up considerable.