Last week we met Joe DeJaeghere, whose parents emigrated from Belgium in the early 1920s; married in Indiana; and moved to a farm near Ghent in 1930. Joe was born a year later, September 2, 1931.

The family was farming between Ghent and Minneota at the time, but soon moved to another farm just outside of Minneota. Joe’s earliest memories relate to this farm during the dry years of the “Dirty Thirties.”

“I remember running on the field, having my feet full of Russian thistle pins. Those days you got slapped for running there. I remember that part †Joe remembered with a chuckle, “And then my sister pulling those pins from my feet.” I think it was in 34.

He was too young to understand how hard those times were for his family and the region, but his young eyes took on sights that stuck with him.

“I knew the drought conditions because of these Russian thistles. That’s all that grew on the pitch. They are very large weeds. They come loose and the wind just blows them through the fences and things. They were tumbling down on the ground. I remember that part of the drought.

A year or two later, he started helping his sister, who was 10 years his senior, with her farm chores.

“My sister used to take me to the pasture to look for the cows – the dairy cows. During those years, they grazed them and went to bring them home. I remember going there with my sister and I was not even 6 years old.

Joe started attending a country school and gained a younger brother, Morris, while he lived on this farm. But the family moved again to another farm west of Ghent

Her role on the new farm expanded, in part due to her mother’s declining health due to a heart problem.

“In the early years when she could do things, she took care of the chickens until I was old enough to take care of them. We had 400 laying hens, which was a lot of laying hens to carry water and food. At the farm we had to haul water and it was uphill as well. (Joe chuckles) You plucked eggs twice a day – you plucked them at noon and in the evening – and you gut them. You didn’t have to wash them, but you put them in a case – thirty dozen per case.

Joe and his younger brother went to a country school, but he had farm chores to do first and last.

“We went to country school – eight levels. I remember we always had to milk cows; feed the calves; separate [the cream]; and have breakfast before going to school. But I went to school. My sister could drive my brother and I to school. We usually walked home at night because it was daylight, then had lunch and started doing housework again.

Joe couldn’t remember precisely when he had started helping with milking in the morning. But he knew he was doing it in 1940, when he was 9, because that was the year of the Armistice Day blizzard. He well remembered the milking during this event.

“Then the next one that I remember vividly was the Armistice Day Blizzard of 1940. It lasted three days. It started on Sunday afternoon and lasted until Wednesday evening. I remember going to milk. We held hands on our way to the barn. Some people used a rope, but my dad was leading. He grabbed my sister’s hand and she grabbed my hand to go and milk the cows. I was 9 years old.

He shared other memories of that blizzard.

“He piled up snow like you couldn’t believe and killed pheasants!” I ran afterwards and found pheasants hanging out on the snow banks. They were frozen to death. We had a 4ft high woven wire fence covered in snow. We could go through the fence. It was the only way we could get to the barn was to walk on the snow banks.

Joe described the tallest building on their farm and its multiple purposes.

“We had a hipped roof barn where you stored your [loose] hay and straw upstairs in the attic. We had a side where we had the dairy cows – ten or eleven dairy cows and the little calves that you bucket fed. And then on the other side, you had your yearlings and your horses. It was still horse breeding when I was younger.

Joe’s fondness for his father’s work horses was manifested when he described them.

“They were crossed, partly Belgian. They were not Percherons or heterosexual Belgians, but good work horses. We had a team he had when he was two and he had them until 1960, I believe, when he gave up horses. The four horses we had when I grew up were Prince and Fly and Jerry and Colonel.

The horses needed some care, but Joe seemed proud to work with them. He laughed as he described his tasks on horseback.

“Well, we cleaned the barns for them, of course. And then you always had to give them hay and oats. And harness – I knew how to harness a horse when I was just a little kid! Exploiting it wasn’t that easy, you know. You had to be brave enough to pass between the horses.

Joe’s responsibilities around the farm increased as he did.

I welcome your participation and your ideas on our exploration of prairie life. You can reach me at prairieview pressllc@gmail.com.