"Miller Family Memories"
"When we were little, we visited my grandmother and grandfather Miller on their farm in Amaranth, Manitoba for Christmas. Saturday night, Grandma would put on a big fire in the range (kitchen wood burning stove) and fill a big tin tub full of water. She kept it warm by adding hot water she heated on the stove and bathed us all in the same water! We could only bath and wash our hair once a week in those days. She would wash her laundry in the winter, hang it outside where it froze and then bring it in to stand it beside the stove and thaw it out. Frozen long-johns are a very scary sight for a child - especially standing soldier straight beside the stove! Everything sure did come out clean and bright though - something to do with the ice I guess!"
Grandma and grandpa lived in a huge log house with a large kitchen and while we had our baths Grandpa, my dad and my uncles would gamble for matches or play checkers. No radio or T.V. in those days! Grandma also had a huge dining room and an old fashioned parlour complete with heavy green drapery, fancy like, old setees and of course the Holy Bible. All of these rooms were decorated with her hand worked dollies. She had four or five bedrooms with beautiful hand made bedspreads, pillow cases and pictures she had done herself. Beautiful!"
"My grandfather Miller, Uncle's Ed and Dudley had a spitoon and chewed tobacco something fierce! They always tried to see who could "hit the spot" when they spit! I could never figure out why my grandmother put up with this habit as she was such a fastidious housekeeper who kept everything sparkling and organized just so! There was no running water and it all had to be brought into the house in pails from the pump which never seemed to freeze up in spite of the cold Manitoba winters. Grandpa Miller had his own ice and smoke houses with a very large shed and hay rack. The men would go down to the lake and chop ice and store it in the
ice house for summer use in packed hay.
Grandma also had a cold cellar under the house and stored all her garden begetables there. She was a wonderful cook and when she moved from Napanee, Ontario to Manitoba, she brought with her a fruit cake sealed in a stone jar which she had kept for twenty-five years! It was still in good shape and tasted wonderful when she finally opened it! Grandma also had a beautiful flower garden with a lot of flowers growing in it you would never see today! She made the most wonderful smelling potpourri from all her different seeds and leaves!""Grandpa Miller, Uncle Ed and Dudley ran the farm. Uncle Dud had a beautiful team of clydesdale horses. One was named Diamond and the other King. He also had a big dog named Frank. When it was milking time, Uncle Dud would send the dog to gather the cows and bring them home. How that dog ever found them all I'll never know as they were scattered over miles of bush area!
When my brother Roy and I were six or seven years old, we always got to go berry picking. At Sunday School picnics Grandpa had a surrey (carriage) we would gad about in. Grandma would always pack the most wonderful lunches - salads, vegetables and desserts! She always wore the nicest old fashioned clothes and hats! I wish I had some pictures of her all dressed up in her finery."
"In the summer, us kids would ride out on the hay rack and watch the men stack hay for the winter. Grandpa always hired extra hay hands. In the fall we got to watch the thrashers and one year Grandma made me a bunch of rag dolls. In those days the wheat was cut by binders and tied into stacks which were then stood up in sets of five or six like a tent. These were then picked up by the men in the hay racks and taken to a thrashing machine. There were about fourteen extra men - all farmers from other farms in the area who had come to the farm to help out. Well, my brother Roy and I had taken the dolls and hidden them in some of the hay stacks then couldn't remember where we had stashed them! The thrashers had to look for the dolls before starting the engines as the dolls would have wrecked the big machines! Grandma was so mad at us because she had to feed all of those men an extra day! But the men enjoyed it because she was the best cook in the district!"
"The Miller's lived quite a piece from Amaranth and it took two or three hours just to get to the nearest town. There was a small general store about a mile from their place and when us kids went there with Grandma, Mr. Rubco, the owner, would give us each a cup of homemade apple cider! Grandma wasn't too happy when he did this because she thought it would cause us all to grow up to be drunkards!"
Those were the happiest days of my childhood. When Grandma Miller died, Grandpa moved to Winnipeg and Uncle Dudley and his wife Illa ran the farm for awhile. The eventually moved to Iowa seeking their fortunes. Uncle Ed moved to Portage and married Agnes Patullo. Later they moved to Battle Creek, Michigan where they both died. When Grandpa died the farm was sold. Uncle Dud and Ila went to the United States and eventually with their dreams unfullfilled moved back to Portage too. Their two daughters had the chicken pox but didn't break out with them until they came to stay with us on our farm. Guess what happened to all ten of us Prout kids!"
"My daughter Audrey and I went back to Amaranth in 1986 to try to find the old farm but the road was all grown over and it was so darn hot! The mosquitoes surrounded us in hordes so we gave up the search. Funny, but now that I think of it where were the mosquitoes when I was growing up there? Selective memory I guess but those were the good ole' days!"
Miller family memories as told to the writer by Iola Prout Winters
March 12, 199 |
