Ernie Hammer is a long time Kiowa County Press contributor. This story is written by Ernie’s Aunt Liz, Elizabeth Katherine (Hammer) Smith Benatti, based on her memories and family research. The story begins in Germany with Oswald Hammer and Margarethe Marie von Barsewisch, Liz’s parents. Liz passed away at the age of 104. She was living at the Kohart Home in Kit Carson at the time of her death. Part 5 can be read here.

Homestead Life

The little house on the prairie it wasn’t.  To start with it was a two-room shed with a tin roof with two by four studs and rafters and old lumber for siding.  It was padded with old newspaper and cardboard on the inside and tar paper on the out.  

As Margarethe had to take over the whole job of rearing a healthy bunch of boys and two girls as well as buying and selling, she became a shrewd business farm woman.  The older boys called our mother “Ma” and we younger ones got the habit and to this day I find myself replying, ”Ma” when I am asked about my mother.  So much is to be said about her strong will…her silent suffering…her tenacity under the most trying situations of bearing 12 children…trying to eke out a livelihood by living on a dry land homestead.

Ma put the boys to work!  Fences were put up with posts dug by shovel and set with barbwire stretched across the fields and pastures.  Often during this time, the neighbors’ cows or that big old Holstein bull would saunter to our watering trough and leisurely drink for mother had us afraid to make a sound.  This particular bull loved our herd as much as his own, Shonts’ herd.  But he was mean and Shonts finally got rid of him because he butted Homer Shonts over the 3-foot-high rock wall that was built around the uncompleted silo and he fell the thirty feet down into and onto the bit of silage that was left from last winter’s feedings. 

As each boy grew to his plowing age, he was put in charge of what patch to plow and when and what would be planted there later.  Each one was particularly proud of the patch he had first plowed so it was usually called after him.  There was Ted’s patch.  Mart’s was called “corn patch” because it was usually planted to sweet corn near the house for roasting ear time.

Plowing also became such disenchantment for there were so many crop failures.  There were sometimes only 2 abundant harvests in ten.  Wind and lack of moisture were the sure causes, but the most disastrous of all crop shortages came from the big cattlemen’s animals.

When Rod refused to go to school after 7^th grade he was put in charge of farming with the horses.  He had done a good job under Fritz and Gerhardt’s managing.  They built the new two-story house for their mother who was certainly overjoyed but kept trying to make them cut expenses down.  For once she was outmaneuvered by those at home.  While there was no electricity, yet it was feasible to wire the house.  They put in a wind charger base for juice to be carried to a set of twenty batteries.  Water came in soon after.

Next week – Homestead Life (continued)  

Summarized by Janet Frederick

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