SEGMENT: TRANSPORTATION
Charles Shuman>UIS Collection S>UIS Collection S, Segment 13
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- TRANSPORTATION
- Describes the different types of transport available over the years. Walked to school in good weather. Had boots, rubberized raincoats. Parents came after students if rainy or snowy. Oiled roads in area today; oil sprayed on every year. Some roads are graveled. When he was a child, roads were mud; after October too muddy except to walk or go horseback. Could drive surrey to town weekly unless too muddy. Mud was so deep, reached the axles. Did not have corduroy roads with logs, but if holes got too deep, they put boards in. Only gravel road remembered was to Masonic Home, which needed coal to heat, so needed reliable road to haul it. Family bought car about 1920. Car jacked up from fall till spring. Grandfather bought Maxwell in 1916, brass trim, top straps, gas lights, hand crank. He was bank president. First memory in 1916 of plane was barn-storming pilots arrive for exhibition; planes arrived before most cars. Crowd at show came by horse and buggy. Parents moved to town in 1922 because mother was ill and went into a nursing home; had to lease out farm for a time.
- FOOD STORAGE
- Sold cream in winter could keep it cool for weekly trip to market. In summer, delivered more often but difficult to keep cool. So they used part of the barn, lined it with sawdust, and cut ice from the pond. Had ice refrigerator and used pond ice or bought ice. Made ice cream and stored dairy products. Had a milk house with trough down the center. Waste water and pumped water put in it to cool milk crocks in which cream was rising.
- ROADS
- Grain hauled when road was solid, impossible for heavy wagonload over frozen or muddy road. Drove hogs or cattle to nearest railroad yard or in a wagon in the winter with difficulty.