Peering at the Past – What a Letdown Feeling When It Was All Over

The girl would sing all the songs she knew, as loud as she could, hoping to frighten away “whatever evil might be lurking in the thick bushes and trees” as she walked through the “back 40” to bring home the cattle when they had wandered to the far reaches of the family farm. Although the youngster loved that family farm, she dreaded that particular cattle-fetching chore because the back 40 was wild and wooded.

Mabel Emma (Redmann) Sipila (1904-1999) was born in a log cabin on South Ridge in Mound Prairie Township, Houston County, Minn. She was the sixth of seven children. Her grandmother Redmann, who lived nearby, delivered the first six. Because of a difficult delivery, a doctor was called to deliver the seventh. As a senior citizen and grandmother, Mabel recounted her life story on 139 handwritten pages, copyrighted in 1980.

Mabel’s mother had been born in Germany in 1868 and immigrated at age 25. Mabel’s father was born in the United States in 1870, the son of parents who had immigrated from Germany in 1868. After a three-week courtship, Mabel’s parents were married in 1893.

Mabel’s father, “a good farmer,” cultivated oats, wheat, corn and potatoes on the 160-acre farm that his father purchased and cleared after emigrating. There were eight to a dozen milking cows and some pigs, of which her father was quite proud. Mabel‘s mother always had a large garden, from which beans were canned and cucumbers were pickled. At one time, there was a bountiful strawberry patch. Some berries were canned, but her mother generously gave most away to neighbors and to Uncle Fred. Mabel wrote, “She wouldn’t think of selling them.”

Mabel was considered to be a “fast milker.” She remembered milking cows by lantern light, all the while singing “favorite ol’ songs,” which seemed to make the cow’s rear end move up and down in rhythm with the melody.

Her dad took great pride in the care of the pigs. “When the mother hog was expecting, we took turns watching her at night,” recalled Mabel. “Those little piglets were the cutest things running around.” One mother hog died, leaving two little ones, which the kids adopted, naming them Maria and Herman. The children fed them with a bottle, and the piglets would follow them around. But eventually, the two, four-legged adoptees had to go to market along with the other pigs.

The pigs going to market was a major event. “We would be waiting for Dad when he returned at night; everyone was happy when he got a good price as there were always debts to be paid. And sometimes, he would bring a little surprise for us. It may be just a ring of bologna and crackers, but we loved it.”

Another special event was the birth of a colt. They would sit up all night when the mare was due to deliver. But one time, “we were all tired and decided to sleep through the night, and lo and behold! When we went to the barn in the a.m., there was a beautiful little colt. How we loved it.”

The children were fond of all the fam animals, except for the geese that always made so much noise. “Dad couldn’t stand them, but they came in handy, too, around Thanksgiving time.” Uncle Fred would come over to help with the killing. Mabel hated the children’s chore of plucking the feathers. The geese were washed with bran and then washed again and hung up to dry before being taken to market the following day. Mabel said her mother had good-looking geese and had no trouble selling them.

They looked forward to harvest and threshing time. “Dad used to stack the grain, and he could really make a good-looking stack.” They needed men with teams of horses and wagons to haul the grain from the fields. “What a thrill when that big black engine rolled into the yard and what eats we had – one neighbor probably trying to outdo the others.” Butchering provided delicious fresh pork or beef, and there was homemade cookies, pies, cake and coffee cake. The men arrived for breakfast and lunch was served in the “a.m. and p.m.” The children carried lunch to the men. “If there were young boys or men around, there was a bit of flirting, too. What a letdown feeling when it was all over.”

Butchering was another major occurrence soon after Christmas, usually one large beef and several hogs. Uncle Mark was especially adept at butchering. The ladies made liver sausage, which they boiled and stored. Then for smoked sausage, the casing from the animals was cleaned, a job so messy that later they purchased casing. The meat, beef and pork, was ground and put into the casing by a special hand-operated machine. The rest of the meat was canned, some put up as meatballs – “yum, were they good.” Nothing was thrown away; they also made head cheese and pickled pigs feet.

The pork hams were salted down for five to six weeks and then placed in the smoke house along with the sausages. For the smoke house, Mabel’s father would haul home hickory wood, which would be burned. “It sure had a good smell,” according to Mabel. The sausages were smoked for about three weeks, the larger hams for a longer time. There was thus a supply of meat for the winter. But Mabel did tire of ham and even sausage. When her dad brought home bologna, it was a special treat, as was store-bought bread.

Mabel remembered “pleasant summer evenings after the day’s work was done. How peaceful it was sitting on the front porch, Dad smoking his pipe… I loved to sit close to Mother and put my head in her lap, feeling so safe and secure.

“We were taught respect for our elders. Little Grandma Redmann lived nearby. We would carry their drinking water… scrub her kitchen floor, take baked things to them without complaining.”

Source: The Story of My Life, by Mabel Emma (Redmann) Sipila, copyright 1980