After high school working on the farm did not give me much spending money but it did give a good life with a lot of hard work which I enjoyed. For a couple of years I just went with the flow, but I watched the other friends who had jobs in town have much more spending money and they could do things that I couldn't because of a lack of funds. I began to look around for ways to increase the cash flow with out leaving the farm. We had an old chicken coop and an abandoned hog house. If they were cleaned out they would hold three to four hundred hens. There was also a small building that my dad had bought from Spoonville at auction. It was in need of repair as the roof had began to leak and would soon disintegrate. I figured this would pro duce enough lumber to build a brooder coop if I tore it down and saved the best parts. It took me some time to build the brooder house but finally it was finished and a new brooder stove was installed. It ran on fuel oil. My first flock of baby c hicks were of the "white leghorn" variety. They were half roosters. They grew fast and soon I had a hundred fifty barb-B-cue size roosters.
They gave me enough money to get a second batch. This time I heard of a batch of chicks that someone had cancelled out of there order, and the hatchery would sell them for a discount if I would take them off his hands immediately. The brooder coop was still full of the white ones and it was necessary to move them to new quarters, clean out the brood er house and disinfect it and get the stove ready . I had a few hard hours to get it done and get the new chicks before dark. I can still remember that it was an extremely hot day and the sweat run fast. These chicks were of the "Rhode Is land" variety and would be red when they got there feathers. They were also of a pure strain that allowed me to sell their eggs to a hatchery for incubation this gave me an added profit as hatchery eggs brought a premium of several cents a dozen fo r the eggs. I made out so well that the next year I built a second brooder house and bought a used stove at auction. I had another good year and had started a batch of chicks that were six weeks old at the time I was drafted into the army. It was my dad s main source of income while I was away in the army. I was proud of the fact that I had raised them for six weeks and had not lost a chick when I turned them over to dad.
After I came back from service I again went into the chicken business but the farm was covered with hills and gullies and you can not pasture chickens on them so dairy cows was added to the farm. to utilize those hills. They proved to be a better source of income than chickens. The chicken business had just been mechanized and had reached the point that thousands would be necessary to show a profit so I shifted gears from chickens to cows. This switch was of necessity. I have always had a soft spot in my nature for the chicken business.
After moving to this farm we brought the brooder houses over here and raised chickens for a couple of years before discontinuing them. They stood empty for a couple of years but when the children became old enough they used them for play houses a nd had much fun in them. It all came to halt when the tornado came through and turned them into kindling wood.