To the north of the Peterson homestead was a farm operated by a bachelor by the name of John Bloomquist he was of Swedish decent and had worked for years for Sears Roebuck Co, in Chicago before coming to Michigan. He had raised several dau ghters and educated them well, One could speak five languages, but after his wife died he wanted to try farming so he came to Michigan. As so often happens when one lives alone he sort of went to seed. He shaved once a year in the spring when the weather warmed up. His clothes usually were in need of a good washing, Sometimes they appeared to have a crust a quarter inch thick on them. I don't know why but he was known as "Plum Bob."He often came over to visit our dad. They would talk for hours. He always had a little bag of wintergreen mints in his pocket for us kids. We thought that he was the greatest. My mother always made pancakes for Sunday breakfast so each Sunday morning at about the time we sat down for breakfast he would show up , my m other always sat another plate for him. As a small boy I was over at his place and noticed the beautiful plants of rhubarb that he had. At home ours was small and spindly so I asked him how he done it . H e told me and I have never forgotten. I h ave followed his method several times with outstanding results. Another time I was there at milking time in the evening. This was all done by hand. He sat by the cow milking into an open pail He had half a loaf of bread in his jacket pocket. as the pai l filled with milk he would tear off chunks of bread and sop it in the foam on top of the milk. Saying this is the way He got his supper. As the years passed the work on the farm was getting to much for him to do alone so he spent a lot of time over to ou r place talking to my dad. He would be complaining at how hard things were going for him but let one of us kids show up and everything would be rosy. In the early thirties his daughters took him back to Chicago. I wrote him letters for a few years. We received a note from his daughters in the early fifties that he had passed away . He was in his middle nineties. When he left Michigan we bought his radio. It was an Attwater Kent battery operated one that had three dials that had to be a djusted to bring in the stations. This was three years before electricity came to our area.

     An early map of 1876 shows that the land to the North of the Peterson homestead was owned by the Van Ettens. They had some boys that were about the same age as the Peterson boys and they played together a lot. One time Mr. Van Etten was trying to discipline one of the boys taking a swing at his head, the boy "Charles ducked and struck his eye on the corner post on the back of a chair. He lost the eye and soon after infection set in and he lost the other as well. Completely blind he continued to play with my dad and his brothers. The Van Ettens left the farm and were gone for more than twenty years. I must have been about six or seven when they came back for a three day visit. We children were instructed by our mother how to act around a blind person. I had never seen one before. She said never to move chairs around the room once he knew where they were. During the visit my dad took him for a walk on their old farm. He wanted to feel how much the trees had grown on the h ill that Tom Holmes now lives as they were just brush and small saplings when he had left the area. My dad took him across an open field in that direction, when they were almost across he started feeling with his cane. My dad asked what he was loo king for. He said that the gate should be very close by. It was then that my dad remembered that a gate had indeed been there more than twenty years before and he was very close to the spot. Those shrub trees that were there when he was a boy have now grown to the point that they are timber size logs.

     Have you ever picked up a board that came from some old building and wondered where the tree stood that it was sawed from? When we tore the old house down I found myself wondering if the boards came from trees on this farm Most of the studding wa s hemlock so I doubt that much came from this area. Some of the flooring was of cherry that L.D. said came off the farm here.

     There is a house standing up on the east side of eightieth Avenue , about a half mile north of Cleveland. It is of a red brick exterior. My dad says that when he was a boy there was a cluster of big white pine trees on the sand knoll bac k of Murrays house. They were cut down and hauled to Nunica to be sawed .{evidently it must have been after the Sawmill at Spoonville ceased operation}. The lumber was sold to build that house up on 80th ave.

     There are not to many white pine trees left on the old Peterson homestead and the market for that kind of lumber is very limited. What the market wants now is oak and cherry . It brings a good price if the trees are of veneer quality. Several y ears ago I sold about forty trees that measured up to the highest quality. The buyer stated that most of them would be shipped over seas to Germany. So part of our farm is now adorning the walls of some homes on the other side of the Atlantic. It is a small world today.

     About fifteen years before Etta and I came to this place the woods back of the barn had been logged off and the new growth was only small sapling trees. But now forty years later many of the trees have reached market size. Especia lly the cherry that in Michigan has a habit of developing a black pulpy center after it gets so old. In 1994 we selected about 35 five trees to be harvested. The tops were cut up for fire wood and is now keeping me warm as I write this. Many of the white pine trees that were only about two to three feet high when the woods was logged off in the thirties have grown to more than two feet in diameter and should be harvested but there is no longer a local market for them.

     I am a bit concerned that the gypsy moth may have a very negative impact on our farm wood lot.. Another concern is the deer population that has exploded in this area. They have chewed off all the new growth of red and white oak saplings. The only new growth coming up in the woods are the weed trees of bitter nut, soft maple and other trees that doesn't taste good to the deer. I like the deer , but I also like the trees. It appears that I can't have both, if only there was a happy medium between the two.

     Some things used on a farm many years ago make no sense to the modern age. If one remains where it can be found in some old shed or barn it has no worth or use they just get rid of it . Many museum pieces have disappeared because of it.

     When the territory was first settled most places in town had a shed out back where a horse or cow was kept. Many sheds housed both. It was necessary for them to buy the feed such as hay and straw. Many farmers took advantage of this market by h auling hay to town. There were no balers in those days so it had to be loaded up loose on the old high wooden wheeled wagons. The hay was slippery and didn't stick to gather. An experienced farmer would use as much skill in loading his load as a mason laying bricks or blocks. Each fork full had to be placed just right to bind the previous one in place The corners would be square and straight up and down. After the load was finished a long pole called a binding pole that had been cut and shaped to do the job was secured in the front of the load by hooking it in the top rung of the standard then laid on the load to the rear end where a rope that had been secured to each corner of the rack was put over the back end of the binding pole . It was pulled down and snubbed as far and hard as your weight would allow you. You would then start for town hoping that the hay didn't shift.

     I can remember we had a binding pole when I was a kid. It was about sixteen to eighteen feet long and about five inches in diameter. It was kept in the barn out of the weather. I only saw it used a few times . After finishing its job for the d ay it was returned to its place up overhead under the scaffolding. It was around for many years after we no longer had need of it . In later years when hay was taken to town with a truck a rope was used from the corners of the load both front and back and a double block pulled up tight held the hay much more secure., So the binding pole went the way of the scythe and other tools

     Every one has seen a picture of a farmer in a pair of bib top overalls standing next to his wife holding a pitch fork in his hand. I always thought that picture gave its viewer the wrong impression of what a farmer really is. The bib tops is seen as belonging to a certain class of people, The hard working dirt under the finger nail citizen who is in a way responsibly for the greatness of this country of ours, Over the years there popularity has deminished some , b ut there are still some diehards who still wear them as a badge of there profession or maybe they can see the practicallity of them. I was introduced to them at an early age even wearing them to school as the school pictures show. To me they are loose around the middle and comfortable . They have larger pockets than the bibless counterpart . The pockets in the bib work fine for a place to store your bookkeeping until you get to the house. My wallet is also stored there now, after it worked out of a back pocket and was plowed under. On fishing trips those pockets are always full of odds and ends where they are easy to get at.

     Slowly the bib top gave way to other forms of attire but there are still a few of us who wear them proudly. Blue is mostly the color of choice but some like the pin strip, all are of the denim material. Maybe they will ma ke a comeback as the fashion of women and girls have found a new market, and they seem to like them.

     Now they are making a come back in a heavy brown canvas that is a favorite of construction workers, You can purchase them with an insulation liner on the inside.

     I have always been proud to wear them not only for the practicality of them but also as a badge of farmer , kind of like a uniform in the army. I have always called them my "barn yard " Tuxedo.

Our interpreters who were interrogating the Japanese prisoners were mostly second generation Japanese nationals who had settled in California and Hawaii. They were full blooded Japanese, but were United States citizens as well. One of our interpreter had a cousin who had returned to Japan for a visit with his Grand parents and got caught there when the attack on Pearl Harbor occurred. He had been drafted into the Japanese armed forces and was sent to the Philippines where he was captured. Imagine the surprise when our interpreter discovered his own first cousin coming through the line. It was a very joyous reunion. The prisoner immediately wanted to defect from the Japanese side to our side. After all he was an American citizen. He made application for the transfer. It was denied. Our interpreter knew that at least he was out of harms way.

     Much of our twine used in the United States came from the Philippine Islands. There were great groves of the plant. When the Japanese took over the islands after Pearl Harbor, they sent down farmers to develop large plantations of the f iber plants. When we returned the crop was thriving and just about ready to start harvesting. International Harvester Company had a big stake in this business. They had shredding machines coming in almost as soon as our troops came. It a ppeared that the right person could easily make a fortune by using a small investment and the cheap Filipino labor. We were discussing the whole thing one time and one of our interpreters jumped up and gave us a tongue lashing and walked away. Saying that we were as bad as they were in the states. At first I did not know what he was talking about. So I got him to tell me what I had said that offended him. It says that his parents had emigrated to the U. S. and settled in Californ ia and developed a large vegetable farm. At the start of the war his parents and all the rest of the Japanese people in this country were rounded up and put in a concentration camp out in the desert. Some one else was reaping the benefits of his parents hard work. I was saying that we could make a killing on the hard work of Japanese emigrants in the Philippines. To him it was a repeat of what had happened to his parents and he was bitter about it. I would have to say he was proba bly right.