I Remember Armistice Day

If November 11th fell on a school day, it was always the same scenario--in grade school as well as high school. At promptly 11:00 a.m. all students would stand, face the classroom flag, bow our heads, and spend two minutes in silent prayer.

It was Armistice Day. The day we thanked God for the end of WWI and for those who had served our country and come home safe. Even though we hadn't been around during that war, we knew enough to be grateful for those who had protected our freedoms, for we actually understood war to some small degree, having lived through WWII as children.

School kids commemorated the rest of Armistice Day as soon as school was over. That's when our teachers led us across town to the riverbank and handed out either white or red carnations. I chose a red one because my uncle, a WWII medic, had come home safe and whole. Some of my friends chose white ones, and though I never asked, I knew that somewhere along the way of wars, they had lost family members.

Once we each had our flower in hand, we tossed them into the river then watched as they drifted downstream, out past the end of town, out toward farm country, past cows grazing on browned grasses and field mice skittering along the reedy banks. I never knew how long they stayed afloat. I always hoped it was a long time so that as the river pulsed past the next town, others would see our flowers and remember to thank our veterans.

Following WWII, Armistice Day became Veteran's Day and rather than honoring only the living, we now honored all who had served in wartime. In my day, we were taught to be patriotic, both at home and at school. And while I always saw old guys around town selling red poppies, I never understood their meaning till I was older. All I knew at that point in my life was that they had something to do with war.

According to the Department of Veteran's Affairs, there are currently 24.9 million military veterans in the United States. And while we can't thank an American WWI vet, since the last one standing passed away in 2009 at the age of 111, we can thank those we know or those we come across in our daily living. Without them, we would not sleep sound in our beds at night nor walk free during the day.

And while this blog is a bit late, it remains heartfelt. For me, now the widow of a Korean War vet, it comes strongly to mind to thank our military day in and day out. Each day they purchased for freedom is a gift to me. They serve, expecting nothing in return. Yet each smile and handshake along with a "Thank you for your service," brings forth an ear to ear grin from even the most exhausted and battle weary troop.

November 11th is the day we honor our military, past and present, and whether we call it Armistice Day or Veteran's Day is of little matter, for what we acknowledge is the fact that at one time in their lives, each veteran and current troop signed a blank check payable to we the people, promising to guard our shores, our people, and our way of life--even if it cost his life. How on earth can we do less than go out of our way to say "Thank You?"

History tells us that The Great War took place from 1914-1918 when the Central Powers of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey faced off against the Allied Powers comprised of Great Britain, Russia, Italy, and Japan. By the time WWI ended in defeat for the Central Powers, more than 9 million soldiers had been killed and 21 million more had been wounded. 

While battles raged here and there, the one most remembered today is the battle of Yrpes  in Belgium and had it not been for Lt. Col. John McCrae, a Canadian doctor attached to the 1st Field Artillery Brigade, it is likely no one but historians would today even give thought to WWI or the Battle of Yrpes in a place known as Flanders Field.

Photos show the battlefield, known as Flanders Field, had been war pocked and churned up to naught more than a barren wasteland. During the second day of battle a young Canadian officer was killed when an exploding German artillery shell landed near him. His close friend, Dr. John McCrae, grieving the death of his buddy, composed a short poem to honor him. He called it "In Flanders Fields" and dated it May, 1915.

Those buried where they
lay were later moved to
a proper cemetery

In Flanders field the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

The American section
of Flanders Field cemetery

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Flanders Field today,
where still the poppies
grow.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; by yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

Thus was born the remembrance flower, the common red field poppy, which now serves as an international symbol of the great loss of life in war. With that bit of history in mind, the next time you see some "old" gentleman standing outside a store with red poppies in hand, toss some change in the pot and wear your flower proudly. Then pass the history on to those who have not learned that in Flanders Field, the poppies still grow.

Posted by Sandy Keith, November 12, 2011, in honor of my husband Jim, a Korean War vet who joined the military at age seventeen, knowing full well he would end up in the war. He served four years active; three inactive, and always said joining the service was the smartest move he'd ever made.

Stuff I Learned As A Kid--Chapter Two

Thanksgiving was a special day as my mom's parents always came to visit. How we girls looked forward to seeing them. Sometimes dinner consisted of roasted chickens; other times it was venison. One Thanksgiving mom cooked a beef roast, though I never had any clue as to where the meat had come from--and little did I care. Looking back, I figure dad must have traded something with another farmer. I well remember the Thanksgiving we had venison. Grandma was eating up a storm, with seconds on everything, even the meat. I distinctly remember her asking dad where he had gotten the beef and mom telling her it was venison. I also distinctly remember that it was the first time I'd ever seen anyone turn green. Grandma stopped eating after that little disclosure. I was glad. More for us. Do you suppose God will take me to task for my utter selfishness?

Christmas was the highlight of our year. My sister and I never figured we'd have tons of presents under the tree. That wasn't how it worked in those days and since we knew no different, we danced with merriment, tossed tinsel on the tree and thought it was beautiful--even though we knew it wasn't. We strung popcorn on thread and made colored paper chains and adorned the spindly tree with the sad little ornaments we'd made and colored with our crayons. It was all magic. We didn't know to expect toys from Santa. Nobody got toys in those days--at least nobody I knew. What we found under the tree were new snow boots or a warm jacket or flannel pajamas. Things we needed and knew that we needed. It never occurred to my sister and me to pout or throw a tantrum because we had wanted dolls with real hair. Young as I was, I knew those new boots were a far better gift considering how hard Minnesota winters were. Do you suppose any of today's kids would be thrilled to have a single small present under the tree knowing the box held something needed rather than wanted?

Wasting food is a sin. I was never sure if it would send me to jail or not but I was suspicious it could happen. Any food on the plate left uneaten automatically put three irrefutable house rules into effect: no dessert, no snacking because I was hungry, and the leftover food had to be consumed before the next meal could be enjoyed. Our oven had pilot lights, which to my dismay, mom used to keep food warm till the next meal. For the most part, the leftovers weren't all that bad. But the day I had to eat the leftover sunny-side-up egg nearly did me in. I gagged it down, but only barely. There was always that image of jail in my mind. Little as I was, I sure wasn't going there over a decidedly unappetizing egg. Then came the day when I'd just plain put too many carrots on my plate. When it dawned on me that my eyes had been bigger than my stomach, I complained that I couldn't finish them. Mom would have none of it. She reverted to her usual comment that there were children all over the world who were starving and I should eat them then and there. In my ignorance, I asked her where I might find an envelope and a stamp. She questioned as to why and when I told her I was going to mail the carrots to starving kids in another country, I got sent to my room for being sassy. Do you suppose I could file a claim against my parents' estate for cruel and unusual punishment?

Your feet were made for walking. With gasoline rationed, new tires impossible to find or purchase, and replacement auto parts unavailable due to the manufacturers turning to building war machines, our family took to walking everywhere we went. When we did need gasoline, the whole family piled into the car for no better reason than to enjoy the trip to the gas station at the edge of town. I remember that gas was twelve cents a gallon and dad always had to produce enough ration coupons to account for the gallons purchased. I also vividly remember the day we went to buy gas and it had gone up to fifteen cents a gallon and my mom, who seldom raised her voice, had such a verbal fit over the cost that even dad couldn't calm her down. Such was life in those days. We walked to the grocery store, the clothing shops, the hardware store and even our church, a good half mile from home. Should my sister and I wish to visit a friend, we knew it had to be via bicycle. That's just how it was. The good thing was everybody else was walking too and during those war years, I think mom "ran into" more of her friends than she ever had before. I remember it well because my sister and I had to stand there and listen to boring, grown-up chatter while enduring the vice-like grip mom had on our hands. Do you suppose that's the reason my hands are still so small and my fingers so short and stubby?

To be continued.....

Stuff I Learned As A Kid--Chapter One

This is one of the posters I recall seeing in merchant's windows. I didn't have full comprehension of how rationing worked, but since my uncle was a Navy medic, I understood that if I went without, he would have enough of whatever he needed to make it home safe. My childish logic worked. He came home safe and sound. 

If you're a kid during WWII, you learn things by osmosis. I know I did. The lessons taught weren't meant to be lessons. They were just part of everyday life in a nation where everything was rationed, all the better to supply our troops first and we citizens last. It was a time of ration stamps and wooden tokens, mended clothes, and unusual foods on the dinner table. I was young enough to know no better. For me, going without wasn't a big thing. Everybody went without--and I personally never saw anyone pouting or ranting about it, for it was an era when every American I knew stood shoulder to shoulder against a common enemy.

In the small farm community where I grew up, farmers and city dwellers alike bartered and traded, especially when the month's ration stamps were gone. Because we had pigs and chickens, with a ready supply of eggs, dad traded our supplies with the farmers who raised beef or who had milk cows. Oddly enough, I grew up strong and healthy, even though I filled my tummy with unpasteurized milk straight from the cow. The one thing I remember is how creamy the milk was. Not at all like today's offerings. I also vividly recall how good that milk was cold rather than straight out of Old Bossy. But maybe that was just my personal taste. At any rate, I not only lived but flourished. Selling unpasteurized milk these days is illegal. Maybe drinking it is illegal too. Do you suppose this belated confession will land me in jail?

We ate strange things. Weeds were a big favorite--especially since they were readily available long before the garden vegetables were fit for the table. Actually, dandelion greens were fought over when mom cooked them. Dad showed me and my sister how to look for the youngest ones. The empty lot behind our house was always green with some weed or another, and once my sister and I knew what to look for, we went at it with gusto. There was such a small window where they were tasty, so we grabbed all we could so mom could cook them up, sprinkle them with vinegar, salt and pepper. We didn't know people weren't supposed to eat weeds. If neighbors today saw me on my hands and knees in the empty lot down the street gathering up dandelions, do you suppose they'd have me committed?

Duck is tasty; rabbit is downright good; doves and quail are so small you have to eat a lot of them; venison is delicious; pheasant is dry unless loaded up with lots of mom's onion gravy. Oddly enough, I thought nothing about eating whatever dad brought home from his hunting forays. My sister and I were told to eat it so we did. And even though we liked chicken the most, we knew dad sold all he could to the local grocery stores and restaurants, so there wasn't always chicken left for ourselves. Besides, we needed to keep the eggs a coming, so there were always a lot of hens clucking around the chicken coop and barnyard. I do not remember one time when any of us complained about the food. We kids were taught to be grateful that we had enough to eat. According to today's guidelines for health, we were most likely over-proteined youngsters. Do you suppose anything bad would happen if the USDA found out about my overly carnivorous past?

Mended clothes can be uncomfortable. Most of the time, the mending was inconsequential. Unless the torn seam had frayed and mom had to take bigger seams to repair the damage. It was worse with blouses than skirts. Underarm seams chaffed the skin when sewn too tight and Lord knows, I put up with some chaffed skin in my day. Socks were the worst. Mom had a small light bulb she stored in a little basket where she kept darning needles, assorted colored floss, and a mixture of holey socks awaiting surgery. My sister and I hated darned socks. As thorough as mom was, making small lattices of embroidery floss across the hole, the sock never laid smooth, and since most of the holes were in the heel....well, you can imagine how comfy they were to wear. One day I got up nerve enough to tell her what I thought about darned socks and why couldn't we just go buy new ones? That was the day I learned that socks for soldiers came first and there were no ration coupons left to buy socks, even if they could be found. Do you suppose I could sue the government for my having to grow up wearing darned socks that blistered my heels?

To be continued....

Author's note: Seems I learned more than I realized for as I was putting this story together, it dawned on me it was far too long for a single blog. I've broken it into chapters. You can read more next week. Blessings to all my followers. Thank you for being so faithful to my blog.

My Feedsack Childhood

So you wish to create a quilt that reminds you of your childhood on the farm. Well, unless you have a grandma or great grandma with a bulging quilt stash she's willing to pass on, you'll have to use the reproduction fabrics available at any quilt shop. They are called feed sack prints, but I argue with that--having worn the real thing for what seemed like forever.

I've read that during the 1930s, quilt making had a huge resurgence as women hoarded every fabric scrap available in order to keep their family warm. Those bits and pieces of cloth became the stuff of today's greatly prized heirloom quilts which have been long hidden from sight or usefulness simply because they are considered a family legacy.

Both my maternal and paternal grandmothers made quilts. Grandma Wood created colorful blankets filled with flannel. They weren't warm, but they were fun to sleep under. Grandma Legler cast her quilts of worn out coats, woolen trousers, flannel shirts and tattered dresses. The colorful quilts smelled like fresh laundry and sunshine; the ugly ones smelled of an old barn. Foolish child that I was, I preferred the pretty ones--even though I froze beneath them come Minnesota winters.

My mom didn't quilt. She was barely even a seamstress. Yet she gave it her best. It was the time of WWII and with everything needed for life rationed, she looked for fabric anywhere she could find it. The white muslin sugar and flour sacks became washcloths and kitchen towels. Her largest supply of free fabric came from our chicken hatchery where it arrived in 100 pound bags filled with chicken feed. Yes. Chicken feed.

Because my folks owned a hatchery in a small town on the southern Minnesota plains, I grew up surrounded by chickens, eggs, feed, and all the other products geared toward helping the farmers raise healthy hens that would produce eggs aplenty until they grew so old they were strictly stew pot offerings. In the meantime, chicken feed deliveries arrived every two weeks and I tried to be there when the sacks came in. My reason was always the same: to scout out multiple prints. I always hoped there wouldn't be any. To my dismay, there were usually three or four of the same design. When that happened, I knew I was doomed.

Mom always grabbed up the matching sacks. She always told the same story of how the feed was for our own chickens, to make sure they grew plump and meaty so the restaurants and food stores in town would order our chickens rather than someone EElse's. Young as I was, I knew that tale made no sense. If it was strictly the feed she wanted, what would it matter if the printed sacks matched?

She had plans for that fabric. And I knew what they were. Empty sacks were unsewn, washed till every hint of feed smell was gone, and then pinned to the backyard clothesline to flap in the wind. So there they waved, announcing to anyone passing by that one of the Legler girls was about to get new clothes. How embarrassing. That feed sack muslin, with its loose warp and weft weave would soon become a sun top or slacks or shorts or worse yet, if mom had three patching sacks, a dress for church or school.

My two younger sisters, whom I labeled as having no taste in clothes, thought they were cute. To me, anything sewn of  feed sacks was the bottom of the clothing world. Yet with textiles so difficult to obtain, I was forced to wear what was in the closet. Then came the day I put on the light blue sundress with the tiny yellow flowers printed on it and dutifully skipped off to school. That was the day it happened.

It entire school was at recess and I was going about minding my own business when I heard someone call my name. Who would it be but Peggy Gunderson. Now Peggy and I were acquaintances, but not what you'd call close friends. Nevertheless, there she came, running toward me with a big smile. As she grew closer, I heard her bullhorn mouth say "Sandy, we have on the same feed sack dress." I wanted to melt into the grass. As luck would have it, a lot of my friends were standing around close enough to hear and then began the questioning. "What's a feed sack? What do you do with it? Did you buy it at the store?" While I remained mute, Peggy filled in all the details and then more. Do you get the picture?

During the 1970s, quilting had another great resurgence and unwilling to let another generation of non-quilters pass by, I was nearly the first one in line for classes. Since I had no stash of quilt fabric, I asked my mom and grandma if they could spare some scraps. Mom gave me a huge box filled with bits and pieces of raggedy remains, but it was Grandma Wood who had the real treasure. Boxes and boxes of pieces came into my sewing room. I began weeding out, tossing fabric here and there. Then I stopped cold. On the bottom of one box lay the remnants of leftover feed sacks. I recognized an apron grandma had long ago sewn for me. And there was a skirt I'd once had. And there were the leftovers of a blouse she'd made.

With such a memorable stash on hand and quilt class moving at a snail's pace, I decided to teach myself to make a Double Wedding Ring quilt. It was the era of trace, cut, and sew--one tiny piece at a time. I spent nearly a year creating the quilt, which I decided had become a twin-sized masterpiece. I took it to be professionally quilted then brought it home and gently placed it across the back of my couch--the better to admire.

Then came the day my daughter and grandkids dropped by and the next thing I knew, Christie was holding the quilt, pointing to a piece here or there and saying aloud how each piece was part of her own life. "Look, mom, there's the dress Grandma Wood made me and there's the apron I had when I was seven and there's the doll clothes you made for my Barbie Doll.

The entire quilt was a combination of three generations. I deemed it a treasure to be passed down so I held it till my daughter's birthday and gave it to her along with instructions to pass on to her children the history of each scrap she recognized. "Be sure your kids know it's a family legacy," I told her, "and not something for the Goodwill Box when it's no longer useful.

Over the years, I've made many quilts yet have none to show for it. All a family member has to do is admire the quilt and it somehow finds its way to them. I figure I had the fun of creating it and that was enough. The joy of passing them on to a son or daughter-in-law or grandchild fulfills my joy. Yet what amazes me the most is how my mind has changed toward the feed sacks. Now that I'm past 70, I look at the years of history I've lived through and the fabrics that accompanied them and I realize I no longer dismay over my feed sack years. In fact, I'm proud of them. I lived in an era when things were kept, just in case someone else could use them. I lived in the time of feed sacks. Few are we who know what I'm talking about and for those of us who walked in those shoes, let it be known that we are the last of a whole breed.

Times like those will never come again. And while it is possible to enter any of today's quilt shops and find feed sack reproductions, few are truly accurate. Today's colors are too bright; the prints too big. My two sisters and I agree that what is passed off as reproductions do not fulfill the true feed sack product. Even so, those chicken feed sacks fabrics remain popular with quilters--most of whom I believe must have been city kids. Farm kids know better. We remember what we wore in those early days and although we know the colors and prints aren't right, we purchase them anyway, cut them into tiny pieces, and then meticulously sew them back together.

I've often thought of forming a club which only those of us who wore genuine feed sack clothes could join. Our goal would be to pass on the history of those years before it is completely forgotten. We can always count on school books to teach our children and grandchildren the history and politics of our nation. But nowhere else will they hear true feed sack stories but from those of us who were there.Now who's with me?

The first quilt I ever made was the Double Wedding Ring. Look closely and you'll find some of the feed sack prints along with other fabrics of the 1940s. Had I kept the quilt, I would have stored it but my daughter chose to use it. I dare say had the electric heating pad not been so toasty, her Persian kitten would probably have been curled up in the quilt. 

Copyright 2011 by Sandra L. Keith, All rights reserved
Photos are the authors and may not be reproduced without permission