The Thompson Farm, Part Two

After opening the door to the stairs, you stepped up one step to a small landing where there were coats, umbrellas, etc. hanging on pegs, then you turned to the right and climbed up the stairs to the north. At the top of the stairs was an octagonal landing with each side little wider than the width of a doorway. Immediately to the left was the door to the spare room. In my lifetime this was used only for storage, but had been used for guests at one time. It was in the southwest corner of the house with windows on the south and the west and it could really get hot in there! Then came a bit of wall without a door. In the northwest corner was the bedroom my mother's brothers shared when they lived at home and which my parents used when we visited. The double bed with the high dark heavy wood headboard and footboard was still there and the old dresser and mirror. When Missy (Merry) was maybe three years old, she was jumping on that bed and lost her balance and hit her mouth on the footboard and killed a front tooth. It turned blackish and looked funny for a while until she got her adult teeth. Then came a door to a closet whose contents I never saw, linens I suppose. In the northeast corner was Gramma and Grampa's bedroom. I am not sure I ever entered it, but from the doorway it looked pretty much like the boys' bedroom. The bathroom was on the east side of the landing. I remember taking baths in that tub when it was necessary to heat water to boiling on the wood stove in the kitchen and carry it upstairs in a big teakettle. Then we would add a bit of cold water from the tub tap to make it a bearable temperature and bathe in about two inches of water. All three of us girls used the same water and then our parents shared another batch. I suppose Gramma and Grampa did this, too, but I don't really remember. To the right of the stairs was the door into the room in the southeast corner that was my mother's when she lived at home and which we girls used when we visited. The big pipe from the woodstove rose up from the floor and through the ceiling in that room, so it was the warmest in the winter. Very little heat got upstairs from that heating oil stove in the front room and it was chilly to say the least in the winter. We would jump out of bed and rush over to dress beside the stovepipe where it was a little warmer. We appreciated the fact that Gramma got up so early to bake and cook and fire up that woodstove! I have mentioned that the flower gardens were on the west (front) side of the house. Gramma had banks of gladiolas, peonies, lilies, and other flowers for cutting. She put bouquets in the dining room and parlor all the time that flowers were available. She also had beds of begonias, ferns, calla lilies and many other flowers whose names I do not know or do not remember. Gramma was a serious horticulturist and flower arranger, regularly winning prizes at local and state fairs. The yard on the east side of the house sloped down (The house was on the highest point of the whole farm.) and was mostly grass, with a two- or three-foot border of flowers all around. Right outside the back door there was a huge elm tree with a wooden board swing hanging by a long chain from a branch high up. The woodshed was just to the south at the end of the sidewalk. When they installed an electric cookstove in the kitchen, this shed became the brooder shed. That is where the baby chicks were hatched and raised until they were big enough to look out for themselves with the other chickens. It was handy to have it right by the house because chicks need so much care at first. It was also a good playhouse when not in use by chicks. South of the house was the vegetable garden. That was at least as big as ours on Shulsen Lane (a quarter acre) with a lot more land devoted to berries. Behind the vegetable garden to the south was the "midden" which we would call the dump. They did not have garbage pickup in the country, so anything that chickens could eat was given to them, anything that could be burned, was, and anything else was thrown into the midden. When you went out the gate from the driveway (or they would have called it the gate from the barnyard) and turned to the right, or east, you came first to the pump house. It looked rather like an outhouse in size, but without the crescent cutout in the door. This is where the water came from. They had an electric pump on a well and the water tasted wonderful! I was too young to really appreciate it then, but I wish I could get some of that water now. It was full of minerals, especially calcium. Just beyond the yard fence to the east was the tractor shed, like a garage but without a door. It was open on the one side so that fumes could not accumulate. Beyond that were the paths to pastures and the sheep sheds. On the left (north) of the tractor shed was the machine shed for the combine, baler, plows, harrows, drills, discs, etc. It was open on the south, also. There was even horse harness hanging on the walls in there. They hadn't used horses since sometime in the 1930s! On the north side of the machine shed was the granary. This is where the corn, oats, barley, etc. used to feed the animals was kept in huge elevated bins. Grampa put a bucket under the spout and pulled open a chute and the grain ran into the bucket by gravity. There were stairs up to the top of the bins, but we were not allowed up there because it was so dangerous if you fell in. You would almost certainly drown. North of the granary were the chicken sheds. Their lights were on timers so that the amount of light stayed the same, winter and summer, so the hens would continue to lay eggs. West of the chicken sheds was the big horse water tank. This also worked well for cows, of course, and had sort of spouts low down suitable for pigs or sheep. Or dogs. The tank was at least twelve feet across and sometimes did duty as a swimming pool for small grandchildren. It was kind of mossy and slimy, though, and I did not really like it. Then west of that was the main barn.