Tragedy Strikes the Farm

   In August of  1973, Fred flew down east with a couple of other fellows on business.  They never made it to their destination but crashed into Lake Erie.  All three men were killed.
   We girls back home of course knew nothing about what had happened. Judy had been going with the brother Eddie Aldinger and she came into the cabin and told me Eddie has just driven up and he was crying. I remember calmly looking at her and saying "Then Fred must have "bought it".  I don't know why I said that but it turned out to be true.  Fred's body had not been found however and would not be found for a couple of weeks. Hope springs eternal and during that time I am sure we all hoped he would turn up again.  One day Jude and I were driving the one ton Red Pig truck up near the airstrip and a plane landed.  I stopped the truck to see who was getting out and definitely had Fred on
my mind, so did Judy.  He had eluded death many times and we surely
surely thought he would do it again.  But it was not to be.  He was cremated and his ashes send back here.  At his funeral I remember his youngest daughter Carla, age three, asking where her Daddy was and it was certainly a very sad time.  Irma needless to say was a total emotional mess and we tried to be supportive of her.  It had been such a shock and Fred had certainly been in his prime with many plans and business deals in the offing.  It was left for Eddie and Irma to sort out and as it does for the living, life went on.  I remember one day when Irma put her arms around Judy and I and asked us not to leave her, we agreed not to.

   In the fall it was time to dehorn the cows and calves and also castrate all the bull calves.  The men in the mill were supposed to help us but it was a really nice day and we three women decided to get going on it.I had after all helped Fred the year before and knew a bit about it and Irma had helped over the years as well.  And so we began a very rough day.  We did have a cattle chute and it had come apart the year before and knocked me on the head a good one! Tamped me right into the ground.  Fred walked over and lifted my cowboy had and did not see any blood and promptly announced I would live.  I hoped it would hold together better this year and gave the side of the chute wide range.  It was necessary to run a calf into the chute and one person would shut the gate behind it, while a person up front would put on a pair or nose clamps and tie the head to one side.  The third person would then scrape the cord leading to the testicles and once they were off, the calf would

receive a shot of penicillin and if he needed horns done as well, then away he would go.  I realised right away when we started that Irma was more or less just cutting clean across and we would be losing calves that way, so I took over the cutting.  The larger cows with horns was a big job and it took all three of us on the dehorning tool to get the horns cut off.  Once off the head sprayed blood all over everyone and even when we applied the blood stopper they would spray for a time.
It was not a job for the squeamish at all.  Doing the calves also required trying one leg with a clove hitch knot and we got rather good at it after awhile.  We has one calf in and ready in record time but when I reached between the legs I found out it was a heifer. Of course! They never fought as badly!  We finished up with the calves and cows just as the men arrived from the mill and I think they were most grateful not to have to do any more work that day.  Some of them looked a little green just looking at us!  We were painted with blood and manure and added to that a good dusting  of blood stopper.  A shower and clean clothes were never so welcome!
The delicacy with supper that night was "prairie oysters" and I did have some but Judy declined.