Pictures from Home

My little sister came through! I recently put out an email request any and all images of the old homestead—the farm where I was raised. I know there were quite a few images taken during that period. I don't know what has got into me lately but I have had a need to draw pictures of my childhood. I do not know why I am doing this but I need to draw these images. When I started I realized that I could not remember a lot of the homestead or little things. I recalled there was lots of “background” in a lot of the family photos. When I consulted the album my mom made for me she had actually gone through the images and cut out all this back ground material. I could not believe it.

I was hoping there was a family archive where mom kept the originals or at least the negatives. Alas I was wrong. It seems the sisters remember mom thinking that no one would ever be interested in negatives and threw them out! I cannot say I was heartbroken but i sure would have liked to have seen what was on them. You never pay attention to things like this when you have the opportunity but once gone their gone.

This image of two of my older brothers is great of those two but what I am really excited about is all the imagery especially the buildings like the sheds on the right. Some of the machinery and look at the be-hives. I had completely forgot these hives. We always had hives and I loved to watch my dad work them. Notice the vehicle parked in front of the house. This was the old Hudson Hornet—a fast back before there were fast backs. Also see the long sloping hill in the background. This was the benches and the lead up to Table rock. You cannot see it here but there is a white cross on the flat top of this hill. The light the cross up at night and looks spooky. There is a 40 acre field just North of house—this is all gone now; filled with houses seems like millions of houses. This is exactly the kind of photos I am looking for. Just a glance at this images brings back memories and unleashes all kinds of ideas for short story and art work. I also found I can do a lot with the photo soft ware on this computer. My cropping and then resizing I can yet bring even more details and lost memories forward.

This image is taken a couple of years after the first image I have posted. This captures my younger sister an brother on our tractor and hay wagon and better yet is the image of the haylifter. Haylifter that is all we ever called this massive machine to throw hay onto the stack. The haylifter was there when we purchased the farm in 1956 and I was always amazed to see the contraption operate. Again, look at the trees in the back ground and a different view of some of the out buildings..

Sometimes I wish I could slip back into some of these photos—maybe that was the email was all about.--Thanks Leah.