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While looking for magazines for Mr. Curtis I came across another editorial about life on the farm that might be entertaining.

A Kid in the Hayfield

The summer weeks of haying time were among my favorite times on the farm. Being the owner’s kid and knowing how to drive a tractor just about guaranteed that I got the plum jobs at haying time. Mowing, crimping, and raking the hay and shuttling the wagons from the field to the barn each presented their own challenges, but I was always thankful I wasn’t pitching bales in a 120 degree haymow with the other boys.
June days started early, and I was eager to get started. I really wasn’t big enough for this job, but there was no way I would admit that. I begged Dad to give me the job of prepping the hay and he needed the help, so at the crack of dawn I headed to the field with our John Deere B and the mower. When mowing with a sickle bar mower you have to drive the tractor fast enough to keep the hay falling backward over the sickle bar or it will bunch up in front of the bar and if I let that happen I would get yelled at by my dad – and then have to clear the mess. You also had to keep the throttle wide open to keep the cutting knife humming along. If you ran it slow the mower would grab the alfalfa and rip it out of the ground by the roots, which would get me yelled at by my dad.
So mornings during hay season found me, an 80 pound kid, bouncing around on the tractor seat as I drove hell-bent for leather over the rough hay field, through the ditches, and over the groundhog mounds, wide open in fourth gear, pulling a lethal machine that would cut me to ribbons if I fell off. I clung to the steering wheel with grim desperation, terrified not so much because falling off might get me killed, but by the very certainty that, if I survived, I would get yelled at by my dad.
I was finished with the day’s mowing by 10 o’clock, and it was time to condition the hay with the crimper. We used the somewhat more civilized John Deere 420 for this task. The crimper had a slip clutch that sounded like a Gatling gun if you let hay get wrapped around the rollers. The sound echoed all over the farm and if I let it happen I would get yelled at by my dad, so I made sure to get off the tractor and smooth out any lumps of cut hay that might jamb up the machine. I had to move right along with the crimper too, not because the machine demanded it but because if I took too much time – that’s right. I would get yelled at by my dad.
By noon my dad was ready to bring the bailer out and bail the dry hay that I had mowed and crimped two days before. I used our Ford 2N to pull a rickety old side delivery rake. I had to go fast enough to keep well ahead of dad on the bailer, but not so fast that the rake would beat the precious leaves off the alfalfa. If he saw a cloud of leaves blowing off the rake – I would get yelled at by my dad.
Once the hay was all in windrows it was time to drop the rake and start hauling wagons of bailed hay to the barn. This was an easy job, except the little Ford didn’t have much in the way of brakes, and I had to stop, shift into 1st gear and creep down the hills.
By mid-afternoon it would get hot out. A breeze or a bit of shade would have made those hot afternoons on the tractor more bearable but, creeping along in first gear the Ford didn’t stir up much of a breeze. It did have a bracket to hold an umbrella that would shade me from the sun, but the tattered remains of the umbrella were hanging from a Sugarlocust branch that hung over the fence bordering our hay field. I won’t relate the details of how that happened, but by now I’m sure you’ve guessed that it resulted in me getting yelled at by my dad.
When you are a kid on the farm you learn skills and responsibilities at an early age - or you get yelled at by your dad.