Building the Cellar

That first summer was really busy.  There wasn’t a spud cellar on the place and Jess had planted the entire farm into spuds.  Jess and Lillis went up above Kelly to get the logs.  Lillis had a truck to haul the logs down.  I don’t remember what we used for sheeting but we covered the top with willows, cut from the canal banks and then covered the willows with straw and then dirt.  I cooked for the men who came to help build the cellar.    By this time it didn’t bother me to cook.     We wouldn’t have been able to build the cellar if we hadn’t received  a  refund from the income tax withheld from our wages in Portland.  This was the first time that taxes were withheld from your pay check.   The amount of the refund wasn’t enormous, but if we hadn’t received it, we wouldn’t  have been able to build the cellar.    We had enough money saved to buy our spud seed.  Fertilizer wasn’t used in those days.  You just hauled out barnyard manure. 

     That fall when the spuds were dug we had an excellent harvest.  They were a good price and we sold part of them to pay harvest expense and saved the rest until spring.  They brought us enough to pay for the ground before expenses.  Mrs.Johansen, who we bought the farm from, came and said that since we had made so much money we ought to pay them more for the ground.    We had good farming years and bad years but that was a turning point.  Now Jess had money to buy a tractor and some machinery.  He was the youngest farmer in Archer, at that time and had the biggest tractor.  The first thing he did was sell the milk cows.