Boyhood Times in Story and Rhyme: Laughter and Lumps, Haystacks and Stumps

HISTORY / PACIFIC NORTHWEST / FARM LIFE. Here are stories and poems from an ordinary country boy, born and raised in a small house with no electricity but a warm wood stove and family. The author and his youngest sister Myrna write about their 206-acre farm with chickens in the yard, pigs making hogs of themselves, cows and horses, cats and dogs; butchering and harvesting; pocketknives and rifles; railroad trestles and swimming holes; hunting and fishing; and all kinds of trouble that a country boy can't avoid . . .

. . . One time, young Delbert's schoolteacher sent a note home to his parents. Disgusted, his dad escorted his boy to the schoolhouse the next morning to handle the situation: "What seems to be the trouble, Miss Jacobs?" Dad asked my teacher. "Your son will not tell me who signed the Declaration of Independence," she replied. Dad grabbed me so fast, lifted me up by my collar, and took me out into the hall. Shaking his finger at me, he exclaimed, "Now listen here, son!" He said, "We have always been poor, but we have always been honest. So if you signed that son of a bitch, you tell her." . . . Enjoy the laughs and lessons between all the lumps and bumps that a farmer's son received while living in the little house, overlooking the Camas Prairie in Idaho.