Post by cottonpicker on Sept 12, 2011 12:17:31 GMT -5
FIREFLIES & CATFISH
Larry D. Davis
Summertime brings back memories of my childhood in the 1940’s. Some of our relatives--the Musics-- lived near Elk Creek in Washita County, OK and many of my earliest and most cherished memories center on activities on or near that farm. The “Music home place” as it was called was a two story white frame structure standing on the south side of a red clay hill where the nearly constant Oklahoma wind kept the place relatively cool during the scorching hot summers and braced against the cold north winds of winter. It was the house where my Uncle, Goebel Music, who married Dad’s sister, Mae, was born in 1908 after his parents settled there and built the home upon their arrival in OK from KY in 1905. The building materials had to be transported by horse-drawn freight wagons from Oklahoma City, 110 miles away. It was there they raised a family before it passed into the hands of Uncle Goebel and in my early lifetime it was a thriving farm with quarter horses, cotton fields, alfalfa, oat and wheat fields. They also had a big vegetable garden and raised chickens and turkeys. It truly was a “working farm” and a veritable hive of industry. During my teenage years, I labored long and hard in the hay, wheat and oat fields during harvest time in the blazing sun from sun-up to sun-down at 75¢ an hour….for 13 hrs. a day.
Elk Creek was located about 100 yards down a long driveway and ran alongside the dirt county road for several miles north and south. The county road was shaded on both sides by a heavy growth of cottonwood, scrub oak trees, sunflowers & pokeweed for as far as the eye could see until it disappeared around a bend near their closest neighbor’s house. The Coy family lived there in a similar big white farmhouse and they had five or six kids who were best friends with my older cousins. I was the youngest of all but they allowed me to “tag-along”and I clearly remember barefooted evening walks with my cousins & the Coys down the cool and shaded lane when, at dusk, the fireflies came out…by the hundreds! We’d chase after them and catch a few to put into a Mason jar so we could watch their “tail lights” flickering-- up close! After that, we’d release them.
Another activity enjoyed by me with my cousin, Goebel Gene who was 10 years my senior, was looking at the model airplane collection he’d made from balsa wood & tissue paper and powered by rubber bands to turn the propellers. He had lots of them in his room, some suspended from the ceiling and some on shelves, located on the second story and overlooking the hill below. Sometimes he’d grow tired of a few of them and we’d wind them up, set them on fire and fly them thru the open window where they’d go down in burning flames and crash harmlessly on the barren red hill below. What a thrill and had no fire marshal to worry about in those days!
Daytimes on the farm were always very busy but evenings were for leisure and some of our favorite pastimes were rifle and pistol target practice or my older cousins along with my Dad and I and Uncle Goebel would head off down to Elk Creek to hand-grapple for catfish. Going down to the creek we had to be wary of occasional water moccasins—
I was deemed too young for this adult activity but my Dad and the others would take off all their clothes and jump into Elk Creek in their “birthday suits” and the grappling began!! They’d swim and wade alongside the creek banks, bobbing up and down, while feeling bare handed all along the banks for catfish nesting places under the water line. They always came up with fish and sometime they would get cut by the sharp fins that all catfish are well known for. A few times I remember they came up with a snake. They would toss the fish out onto the bank where I would run and gather them for safe keeping and later we’d all enjoy a good fish fry.
Indeed…those were memorable times for me. The big farmhouse is long gone and now my cousins are into their early eighties and we no longer have the desire or the energy to chase after fireflies or grapple for catfish. Life and people move on…..times change.
©2010 Larry D. Davis
Larry D. Davis
Summertime brings back memories of my childhood in the 1940’s. Some of our relatives--the Musics-- lived near Elk Creek in Washita County, OK and many of my earliest and most cherished memories center on activities on or near that farm. The “Music home place” as it was called was a two story white frame structure standing on the south side of a red clay hill where the nearly constant Oklahoma wind kept the place relatively cool during the scorching hot summers and braced against the cold north winds of winter. It was the house where my Uncle, Goebel Music, who married Dad’s sister, Mae, was born in 1908 after his parents settled there and built the home upon their arrival in OK from KY in 1905. The building materials had to be transported by horse-drawn freight wagons from Oklahoma City, 110 miles away. It was there they raised a family before it passed into the hands of Uncle Goebel and in my early lifetime it was a thriving farm with quarter horses, cotton fields, alfalfa, oat and wheat fields. They also had a big vegetable garden and raised chickens and turkeys. It truly was a “working farm” and a veritable hive of industry. During my teenage years, I labored long and hard in the hay, wheat and oat fields during harvest time in the blazing sun from sun-up to sun-down at 75¢ an hour….for 13 hrs. a day.
Elk Creek was located about 100 yards down a long driveway and ran alongside the dirt county road for several miles north and south. The county road was shaded on both sides by a heavy growth of cottonwood, scrub oak trees, sunflowers & pokeweed for as far as the eye could see until it disappeared around a bend near their closest neighbor’s house. The Coy family lived there in a similar big white farmhouse and they had five or six kids who were best friends with my older cousins. I was the youngest of all but they allowed me to “tag-along”and I clearly remember barefooted evening walks with my cousins & the Coys down the cool and shaded lane when, at dusk, the fireflies came out…by the hundreds! We’d chase after them and catch a few to put into a Mason jar so we could watch their “tail lights” flickering-- up close! After that, we’d release them.
Another activity enjoyed by me with my cousin, Goebel Gene who was 10 years my senior, was looking at the model airplane collection he’d made from balsa wood & tissue paper and powered by rubber bands to turn the propellers. He had lots of them in his room, some suspended from the ceiling and some on shelves, located on the second story and overlooking the hill below. Sometimes he’d grow tired of a few of them and we’d wind them up, set them on fire and fly them thru the open window where they’d go down in burning flames and crash harmlessly on the barren red hill below. What a thrill and had no fire marshal to worry about in those days!
Daytimes on the farm were always very busy but evenings were for leisure and some of our favorite pastimes were rifle and pistol target practice or my older cousins along with my Dad and I and Uncle Goebel would head off down to Elk Creek to hand-grapple for catfish. Going down to the creek we had to be wary of occasional water moccasins—
I was deemed too young for this adult activity but my Dad and the others would take off all their clothes and jump into Elk Creek in their “birthday suits” and the grappling began!! They’d swim and wade alongside the creek banks, bobbing up and down, while feeling bare handed all along the banks for catfish nesting places under the water line. They always came up with fish and sometime they would get cut by the sharp fins that all catfish are well known for. A few times I remember they came up with a snake. They would toss the fish out onto the bank where I would run and gather them for safe keeping and later we’d all enjoy a good fish fry.
Indeed…those were memorable times for me. The big farmhouse is long gone and now my cousins are into their early eighties and we no longer have the desire or the energy to chase after fireflies or grapple for catfish. Life and people move on…..times change.
©2010 Larry D. Davis