From Where I Sit The Olden Days

Larry Eiss

I was the first of three boys who constituted something of a second turn at bat for my parents.  My two older brothers were in their late teens and beginning to leave home. Mom felt that she would be lonely without kids around the house while Dad was at work all day, so she convinced Dad to start again. He was 40 the year I was born. Twin boys followed less than three years later.

Dad turned 90 on June 1. He still has a good mind, drives much more than I’d like, and walks without trouble of any kind. His latest birthday, and some other changes about which you’ll learn later, has me thinking about all Dad has given me over the years.

Dad grew up on a 400-acre dairy farm near Evans Mills, NY. In the early days much of the field work was done with a team of horses. There was no such thing as television; no one even had a radio. Dad remembers a salesman going around the area trying to get people to buy one. Paved roads were essentially nonexistent, and cars were rare in the extreme. Dad’s grandfather owned the local telephone company and all the telephone wires in the area. Of course not everyone had a telephone. Many still had no electricity.

The family ran the farm, and Dad attended a one-room school with some of his six siblings, though some were young enough that he was out of school before they entered. At lunchtime, he would sometimes walk back home and dipper out a quart of milk to have for lunch from one of the cans in the milk-house. The milk-house was a small building through which flowed the water from a sizable stream. Milk cans sat in the cold water so the fresh still-warm milk would cool and remain fresh until it could be taken to town on a horse-drawn wagon (later it went by truck) to be sold.

Dad’s father was the first farmer around to have a car. He was also one of the first to get a tractor. The earliest of them had steel wheels. By today’s standards they were nearly impossible to use, but compared to horses, even those early tractors had benefits. Tractors didn’t get lame from stepping into woodchuck holes. They could pull a lot more weight and plow faster too.

Parenthetically, gasoline was about 18 cents per gallon then, but if you adjust the gas price in the 1920s for wages today, gas was like paying about $6.00 per gallon.

At about the eighth grade, Dad left school because he was needed full-time on the farm. He was a reader and had good instincts about machinery due to all the hands-on experience gained on the farm. Consequently, later in his life he became a machinist and toolmaker. His job was so important during the Second World War that he was one of the few men of fighting age who did not go into the military. Instead, he was exempted to stay home and make airplane parts at Pratt and Whitney in Connecticut.

When I got married and left home 30 years ago, I took it for granted that Dad was there to help me when I was stuck. One time my car stalled and wouldn’t start. He arrived on the scene, got in, turned the key and the car took right off. I thought it was some amazing magic on his part, but he told me the carburetor was flooded and had just needed time to dry out a bit. He didn’t complain or make me feel bad for making him drive nearly three hours round-trip for nothing.

Dad has decided to sell his house. From the age of six I grew up in that little bungalow on Kingdom Road. Dad has been there some 44 years now. It will be a major change for all of us, but mostly for Dad. I visited him a week ago to help him put the house on the market. Our realtor gave us guidance with regard to pricing, and we listed the house on a Saturday. By the following Thursday we had two offers and more than 10 prospective buyers had seen the house! It sold on Friday for more than the asking price. What year is it again?

Much sooner than we anticipated, Dad will move into a nice apartment in our basement. In about two months, things will be very different. Despite his having to make some adjustments, there will be real benefits. He’ll have to drive less. He’ll get to see his great grandchildren frequently. He’ll maintain his independence, but help will be immediately available. He’ll live where he is loved and cared for rather than in an institutionalized environment.

The values he instilled in me and the sense of identity he gave me through his stories from “the olden days” have benefited me far more than the money he lent me or the times he came to my rescue. Now it’s my turn to be the one who helps, and I welcome the opportunity. From where I sit, it’s the least I can do for the man who has done so much for me.

Though I can think of several, I have included no link to software in the column. This time around I simply wanted to honor Dad. Thanks very much for indulging me.