The Emersons - An Interview with Ray, Part Two

Ed's Day Wednesday

Dear FOLKS,

Each Wednesday I continue to share family information that was provided by my late cousin Edwin J. Ostrom. We now focus on stories and anecdotes regarding Ed's maternal grandparents, Reinert Immanuel Emerson and his wife Dora Elisa Nilson, numbers six and seven on Ed's Ahnentafel report. We have learned of the records found for Reinert that I wrote earlier as a report. You can see this report by clicking here.

In recent weeks the memories have included those of their children Ruby, Geneva, Lola, Ole, Alice, Ivene and Vivian. These you can read through the following links:

• Ruby's story by clicking here
• Geneva's story by clicking here
• Lola's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here
• Ole and Alice's stories were combined here
• Ivene's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here
• Vivian's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here
• Verola's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two by clicking here
• Ray's Interview (Part One) by clicking here

The interview takes a deviation from the format of the previous stories. In September, 2007, cousin Ed traveled to Alberta, Canada to get better acquainted with his Canadian relatives. In particular, Ed spent four days with his Uncle Ray Emerson. During this visit Ed taped numerous conversations and upon his return home, he transcribed these conversations. 

Today we'll begin Part Two of this interview. This isn't intended as a tutorial on how to conduct a taped interview. Cousin Ed does share some good ideas on how to "document" the conversation. He didn't follow along with a set of published questions for an oral history interview, but I am sure he had some questions already formulated that he wanted to ask and I expect he had these written down. Then too, as you'll see, occasionally his Uncle Ray takes the lead in the conversation and suggests changing the visit by going fishing or requesting a break. It is fun to witness the exchanges between these two individuals.

Ray Emerson Stories - Part Two

Told on tape to his nephew, Ed Ostrom 

September 11 thru Sept 14, 2007

Ray Irwin Emerson b.1912

It is now that second day of the visit to tape an interview with Ray Emerson. We begin where we left off, the date is now September 12, 2007 and it is mid-morning. We are at 259' of Tape-Side B [tape labeled 9-11-2007]. To explain the format of this interview,  an example ... 123’ represents the location on the tape for reference. Brackets around text represent [edits by Ed]. Text in italics, comments by Darlene.

We are backing up one numbered topic to keep the context of the interview in order; 65. Bulls has been repeated from Part One.

65.  Bulls

Ed:  Do you have your own bulls or do you bring them in?

Ray:  Sometimes you gotta get other bulls because you don’t want them to get related and that’s no good ay. A lot of times we get trained bulls from some other guys who raise bulls. You gotta replace your bulls ever so often. 

Ed:  Do the bulls go out into the fields?

Ray:  Well, yah you turn them loose when you want them at a certain breeding time ay.

Ed:  When is that?

Ray:  Well that’s about oh mid-June, first of July, somewhere in there. Otherwise your calves come a little too early in the winter and you don’t want that. You move your calves and cows out in the spring ay so that’s why you hold your bulls for the right time.    

Ed: So the bulls just sit around. I saw some out in the field here. They just lay around?

Ray:  Ya, ya. There’s two or three out here yet. Three of ‘em I think. And you know when the breeding season comes, they go to work. 

Ed:  They go to work…[laughing.]

Ray: Ya

Ed:  Do you bring the cows in, kind of confine ‘em a bit?

Ray: No, you turn some bulls right in with the cows. 

Ed:  Must be interesting to see that huh? 282’

Ray:  Oh, ya. Down on our lease here, as soon as a cow gets in heat, well then the bulls are there. When three or four bulls are  after the same cow they get into quite a bit of fighting over the business. ya.

66.  Ray’s stories have value

Ray:  This don’t mean too much to us, but maybe to you it’s a little different, ay. As for us it’s just an ordinary thing huh?  [Ray refers to farm life.]

67.  Boys take an interest

Ray:  I’m sure glad my boys take an interest in it, otherwise I’d be left alone and I couldn’t do it ay. But they take an interest and a grandson does too.

68.  Making items

Ed:  About making items? 299’

Ray:  Well, I made our own baby crib and high chairs and rocking chairs. We couldn’t buy any stuff and we had lots of wood around so we made them. Ya. 

IMAGE: Ray Emerson made this kitchen table
from local fir wood we sat at while recording
his stories. Photo from Edwin J. Ostrom's
family collection.

69. EmPh42 - The Planer

Ed:  Ray is looking at [photo] file EmPh42. It’s a photo of James Emerson’s planer. He’s going to talk about the photo. Do you recognize those? I can hold it for you.

Ray:  Oh, sure. Sure I do. There were lots of sawmills around the country in the early days. Yah.

Ed:  Did you work on that mill? 

Ray:  Oh, I sure did. We did lots of sawing. This mill was just across the road there at Ole’s. We had the sawmill set up there and people would haul logs…we should have pictures of all the log piles. But I can’t find ‘em. That’s the planer on the top. 

Ed:  Do you recognize who that is?

Ray:  No.

Ed:  That’s hard to tell. 

Ray:  Yah it’s pretty hard to tell.

Ed: The person in the top on the planer??

Ray:  Where did you get these photos from?

Ed:  My mom… 

Ray:  Oh.

Ed:  Has ‘em. I’ll send you one. I’ll mail you those. Who owned the mill?

Ray:  Well in the first place we made it. James brought up the saw on that immigrant car and then we made it from there. 324’ then we tried to find chains for it, tried to find old Ford wheels. You had to have that drive ay, flexible drive. It wasn’t that easy to do, that’s for sure. James used a steam engine in later years on his sawmill. He did a lot of sawing. 

Ray:  Did you ever see a sawmill work?

Ed:  I’ve seen some but..

Ray:  Too bad but a fella not too long ago was in here sawing for a guy down south here, eh. He had a portable mill he can move around.

Ed:  What kind of logs are those in the photo?

Ray:  Well it’s kind of hard to tell but they look like spruce logs.

Ed:   Are there trees around here that big now? 341’

Ray:  Well, in places they are pretty big ya. There are odd places down south. There is one section where they are very big. There’s some pretty big ones down south in the bush there. You could get some pretty fair log there yet.

Ed:  Did you work on that mill too.
Ray: Oh sure we all worked on it. Yah I used to file the saw. 

Ed:  Saw filing was an art wasn’t it?

Ray:  Well yah you had to make sure you didn’t get the leading edge of the teeth on an angle. You had to make sure you got them square cause if you filed them a little on an angle then of course the saw would run away so you had to make sure that they were filed straight across.

Ed:  Were you the filer?

Ray:  Well I did some but Ole did a lot of it too. I know James wasn’t much on filing but Ole and I we filed the saw quite a bit.  Yah we did a lot of it. If I could just find some of the pictures, there of the mill and the log piles we had. I’m going to look again and see if I can find ‘em. They’ve got to be here somewhere. 360’ 

Ed:  What kind of planer was it?  

Ray:  Where there are lots of makes of planers. The first one we had was pretty small but a guy used to come from Spirit River and do a lot of planing. He had a bigger planer. He could make wider shiplap and stuff. James owned a planer but it was small. I think it only would take up to about 6 inches wide. But then the bigger planers could make it so much wider.  

Ed: What kind of wood is being planed here? 

Ray:  I’m not sure but it is likely spruce. I’m sure that bottom log is spruce. 389’

 

IMAGE: James Emerson running his planer, circa
1928. Photo from Alice Emerson Ostrom's album.
[file EmPh42.]

70.  Not many interested

Ray:  390’ Ah, ain’t it something. There aren’t many guys like you that you are interested in old history and stuff.

71.  Ray’s Photos

Ed:  Are your photos like this or are they different? 

Ray:  No they are different. I’ve got one that shows a big pile of sawdust beside the sawmill but I’m going to look again to see if I can find those pictures. I don’t know what the heck happened to ‘em. Elsie runs thru the photos so they get all mixed up. 

72.  Emerson kids and Coyote Pets.

Ed:  Ray is going to talk about [photo] file EmPhoto 35. It’s a black and white picture of the Emerson homestead in North Dakota of kids holding coyotes.

Ray:  Oh ya. Some of us found the den. I’m not sure who it was now. We dug it out and found 8 babies. That’s what we’re holding in the picture, little coyotes, ah. 

Ed:  What happened to the coyotes?

Ray:  After that we had to kill ‘em, ay.

Ed:  Did they bite you?

Ray:  They were so small. Small pups like don’t bite. See the twins there holding ‘em., Ivene, James, William and that must be myself here.

Ed:  425’ My mom?

Ray:  Yah, Alice.

Ed:  Is that Alice?

Ray:  Your mum.

Ed:  …or Estelle?

Ed:  Is that my mom or Estelle?

Ray:  No it kind of looks like Estelle. Sure looks like Estelle to me ya.

Ed:  Yah I think it is. Well after the pups were killed what happened to them, did you skin ‘em?

Ray:  Well, No they’re not worth nothing so we just threw ‘em away somewhere and whatever we done with ‘em I don’t remember now. 

Ed:  How did you kill ‘em?

Ray:  Well, hit ‘em in the head I guess. Grab ‘em by the hind legs and hit ‘em on the corner of a wall or something.

Ed:  Did the girls help do that?

Ray:  I don’t know what did that. But look at them they are pretty bright ay. That one looking at us with its ear up. 

Ed:   Ivene thought maybe Bill killed ‘em.

Ray:  Oh that could be. That sure could be. I wouldn’t know for sure. But they had to be destroyed. That’s what we had to do. 444’  We didn’t want too many coyotes around anyway so that was a way we got quite a few coyotes. 

IMAGE: Emerson children hold coyote pups, circa 1926 at
family homestead in North Dakota. Back row- L to R:
James, Oliver, Estelle, William and Rex the family dog.
Front row: Ivene, Vivian, and Verola. From the Edwin J.
Ostrom family photo collection. [file EmPh35]

73. Coyotes and hounds

Ray:  In North Dakota guys would go around with a team of horses and hounds and then would get coyotes, ya. When they found a coyote they’d turn the hounds loose. They were in a horse-drawn sleigh and box and when they noticed a coyote they’d drive across the prairie, open the back and the hounds would catch ‘em. They would take the hide off and sell ‘em. They were worth a few dollars uh. That was how you made money huh, you’d get a few dollars.

Ed:  Did you sell hides too in North Dakota?

Ray:  Well, no I don’t remember selling any hides in North Dakota. I suppose we did but I just don’t remember.

Ed:  464’ How about the house in the photo? Where was it taken? Do you recognize that? 

Ray: It looks like a little, there’s a door, and there’s a barrel and there’s a dog. That’s an old churn, looks like. 

Ed:  The barrel is a churn?

Ray:  Well it looks like an old churn there. It’s not very big you see and it looks like it has a screw top. Remember they used to have these churns, these big churns to make butter. That’s what I think that is. It used to be in a kind of a cradle where you could tip it, ay.

Ed:  What do you remember about the dog… Rex?

Ray:  I don’t remember him. That’s for sure. No I don’t. Gosh. That is going back a long time then.

74.  Emerson Log School

Ed:  482’ Now we're looking at [file] EmPh100. It’s of a log school that Sharon thinks is in Alberta and south of Eaglesham. What do you think it is?

Ray:  That’s of our Creeks School. I made the window frames and put in the windows of that school.

Ed:  Where is that school?

Ray:  It’s destroyed now. A guy pulled it into his yard. But it was down here from our creek ay. 

Ed:  Is that south of hwy 49?

Ray:  Yah. 

Ed:  South of your place here,

Ray:  Yah and east of here too.

Ed:  Did Ole go there and who went there?

Ray:  No not Ole, ‘cause we were already up here. One of the guys, one of the trustees brought a bunch of lumber for me to make these windows. I made them in James old log shack. I made them in two sets, then I took them down there and put them together. I had to do some hewing inside where the logs were kind of rough. Another guy built the log building. Some of our kids must have attended this school . 

Ed:  Did you make the little window muntin bars too?

Ray:  No the windows were made. 513’ Remember when you raised the window there were those two plugs…to hold the window at a certain height? I put them into some of these windows. I had to make them in two sets because that way I could haul them down and put them together on site. Another fella by the name of Pete Peterson and myself, made those first desks the children used. They got us some good fir lumber and that’s what we made for the kids. Ya.

Ed:  529’ When you said you hewed the inside, did you do it after the logs were in place or before?

Ray:  Well, no a lot of it was done. The logs were round inside and out but there were some high places or a crook on the log that I had to chop off and smooth a little. Doing that kind of work inside was difficult.

Ed:  Spruce logs?

Ray:  These were maybe jack pines, I’m not sure.

IMAGE:  Creek’s School. Ray Emerson made the
window frames. Photo by Sharon Ostrom K.,
June 1957. [file EmPh100]

75.  Chinking

Ed:  What did they use between the logs?

Ray:  They laid Oakum in between the logs and then before that we would just get moss and chink ‘em. We had a little place where there is this nice moss and use that. We made tampers ay and put moss in the cracks between the logs. 553’

Ed:  There’s your dovetail corners.

Ray:  Yah. And you’d use dividers so you’d know how deep you’d have to take out of the next log.  

Ed:  Did you angle the ends so that the logs stayed together?

Ray:  No. No. 

Ed:  But wouldn’t water run towards the building that way or did you slope it two ways?

Ray:  It sloped two ways.

Ed:  It sloped two ways…oh goodness that’s a complicated cut. 

Ray:  It is a little but it wasn’t too bad…and you get used to a lot of this, ay. 566’

76.  Raymond with horse

Ed:  We’re looking at EmPh55 Who is that?  

Ray:  That’s Raymond, my son. He trained his horse so it would raise up and then he’d get her to do that.

Ed:  Dad had it right and I misread the caption thinking it was you. And that’s at your farm here?

Ray:  Yah I expect it is. I can see that, that it’s here. I see my building here.

IMAGE: Ray Emerson's son working with the horse he
trained while on the Emerson farm as white-trimmed
building in background, July 1965. Photo source Alice
Emerson Ostrom. [file EmPh55]

77.  Red buildings & white trim

Ed:  I like your red buildings & white trim. It’s beautiful. 

Ray:  Well I kind of went that way. I wanted to paint over it again this year but I just couldn’t make er. Some of these buildings are old and if it wasn’t for me painting and keeping them up they wouldn’t be here. Someday it’s going to happen that I just can’t do it. I don’t know what will happen then. Yuh. 

Ed:  Well your farm is just beautiful with the red walls and white trim.

Ray:  I’m kind of fond of it. 598’

Ed:  Was that your choice?

Ray:  Oh sure, ya.

78.  Memories of parents and siblings

Ed:  Do you remember your dad ever telling any stories or anything, about your grandfather Raymond?

Ray:  No, I don’t know of any. I don’t remember any anyway. 

Ed:  How about his wife…your grandmother?

Ray:  No

Ed:  Her name was uh…I forgot. Tallachsdatter. Here’s a picture of Raymond’s wife.

Ray:  [Looks at a photo of his grandmother] Is that right? 

Ed:  That’s your paternal grandmother and her name was Inger Tobine Tallachsdatter. They never talked about her?

Ray:  No. No.

Ed:  Alright.   

Ray:  See the thing is I left North Dakota quite young. I was 16 years old. When I got up here with a bunch of other guys we just didn’t talk about those things and I didn’t have any photos. We didn’t have anything when we came up here, just the shirt on my back was about it.

Ed:  How about did your mother Dora ever talk about her mother Nielsen or your father Emerson?

Ray:  Nielsen? No, I don’t remember. 

Ed:  Do you remember any stories they were talking about?

Ray:  You see the thing is when I left home, I was 16 and I missed so much of that ay.

79.  George Emerson, son of Reinert’s brother Ole

Ed:  Now we’re at EmPh71 a photo of George Emerson. What do you remember about him?

Ray:  Well, George used to come and stay at our place quite a bit ay. And of course him and dad used to fool around quite a bit.  649’ He was really my pal, that’s for sure.

Ed:  George was?

Ray:  Ya

Ed:  Did he ever talk about, about WWI? Did he have a sense of humor…or??

Ray:  Yah, he had quite a bit of humor.

Ed:  What did you and he do that was fun? 

Ray:  We palled around and I believe he gave me a watch one time, a dollar watch, an old dollar watch. I was so proud of that watch he give me. I was pretty young then and it’s hard to remember all of these things that’s for sure. 

Ed:  How about George’s father Ole, you probably don’t remember anything about him??

Ray:  No. [Ole was Reinert Emerson's brother, making Ray Emerson and George Emerson paternal first cousins]

IMAGE: George Emerson (1896-1976) in WWI uniform.
Photo from his daughter copy given to cousin Ed Ostrom
for his collection for family photographs.

80.  Chris Emerson, Reinert’s brother

Ed:  Do you remember anything about your uncle Chris Emerson and his wife Karen?

Ray:  Well, Chris, I do remember something from him because when we made a trip out to the pacific coast one time, Chris was along with William, my brother William. We all met in Seattle when the folks were out there. Chris was a kind of happy-go-lucky guy. A lot of fun.

Ed:  I heard he shook. 

Ray:  Oh yah, very shaky. Some of ‘em had to grab his other hand ‘cause he would spill the coffee he was drinking.

IMAGE: Wedding portrait of Christopher
Andreas Emerson (1874-1955) and Karen "Carrie"
Bregetta Johnson (1881-1932), taken in July
1899. Photo from the family collection of
Edwin J. Ostrom.

81.  Steady hands

Ed:  I notice you’re not shaking Ray.

Ray:  No. I’m steady pretty good, ay.

Ed:  And you don’t wear glasses?

Ray:  No. Oh, I have glasses but I don’t need ‘em. 

Ed:  What do you remember about your dad? That’s your dad in this photo. tape ends 703’

End of side B. tape, dated 9-12-2007 

Begin new tape.

Begin Tape dated 9-12-2007; 0’

Ed:  It's about 11 o’clock,

Ray:  10:30

Ed:  10:30 a.m. This is Wednesday, Sept 12, 2007. Ed Ostrom. We’re at Ray Emerson’s house in Eaglesham, Alberta talking about various things. What are we talking about?

Ray:  I don’t know. I think we were trying to explain our old sawmill and the building of them and stuff like that.  

82.  Reinert Emerson

Ed: OK, how about…if we talk about…What do you remember about your dad Reinert. Was he nice or mean or was he???

Ray:  Oh no. Dad was very good. I think maybe I was kind of his favored boy. I don’t know but he used to…there was a neighbor that used to come over once in awhile. He was a moonshiner. Mother had no use for him at all but dad got such a kick out of it, you know he’d sit there and laugh. Dad was good for sure. He and Martin come up here in ’26 before we came up. They were figuring on looking at land and moving out of North Dakota 'cause of that drought down there. The lack of water turned him against this country. 20’ Now they are making big dugouts and getting water so we are getting by that way. I have a dugout on my farm here that is about 25 feet deep. 

83.  Fishing

Ray:  And Ostrom [referring to me, Ed] he was down there doing a little fishing. I hope he can get one anyway. That would be great for him. I’m a little sore to get around. I’ve got shingles and it’s a little miserable so I don’t move around so good. What else?

84.  Dora Emerson

Ed:  What do you remember about your mother. You mentioned yesterday, that she laughed when you did cooking.

Ray:  Mother and dad and Stuart Ditch’s folks came to Canada one year. Mother got such a kick out of us guys making meals, or trying to make meals. That would be quite a thing to see your sons who had never cooked before finally having to cook.

Ed:  Did you learn how to cook from your mother?

Ray:  Well no. We didn’t. There were all those girls at home. We didn’t know nothing about cooking when we came up here, that’s for sure. 37’ You had to learn, learn the hard way. When James, Ole and Tony were together, we boarded government crews cutting roads. That kept us pretty busy. There was always some men coming and going with the sawmill so we had to do a lot of it. Ruth, Ole’s wife, was good. She made cakes and pies and we took care of the other kind of cooking, the main cooking.

85.  Learned as a child.

Ed:  What was the first thing you can remember as a child in North Dakota?

Ray:  48’ Well, I remember down in the garden stealing peas. I remember that. I liked peas pretty good and I’d crawl in between the rows so mother wouldn’t see me. Yah, well that didn’t fool her any ‘cause she’d see the pods ay laying around there so you don’t get away with nothing. You think you do when you’re young but the old people they outsmart you, for sure. You don’t get away with much.

Ed:  Did you hoe the garden? What was your role as a child? Did you have to do some work? 

Ray:  I did some garden work, weed pulling and stuff like that. The more you work and hoe a garden and keep it the better garden you have. You should see some people’s gardens. You can’t tell if it’s vegetables or weeds ay. But one thing here we keep the garden pretty clean. 

Ed: Was your mother the one in charge of the garden?

Ray:  Well mostly ya.

Ed:   Of what to do?

Ray:  Ya. She was pretty well a garden person.

Ed: If you tried to cook would the girls let you?

Ray:  Well, we didn’t even try at home. I was so young and when we came up here. I had to learn or I didn’t eat. We gotta eat so…

Ed:  Did you learn from your mother some knowledge about gardening?

Ray:  Oh sure. I learned how to tell what was peas and what was this and what was that. I learned how to keep weeds out of the garden as much possible. 

86.  No talking Norwegian

Ed:  Did your mother and father talk Norwegian together?

Ray:  Not in the later years. But I understand from Ole and William they only talked Norwegian when they were small. Mother and Dad they kind of cut it out as they thought it would make it easier for us in school. So I never did learn it. I never did learn Norwegian. I picked up only the odd words, ay.

Ed: Like what? What words?

Ray:  Tak ska dall? Thank you. I don’t remember the other ones. 82’ But tak ska dall thank you something like that but I probably don’t pronounce it quite right. 

87.  ND Homestead

Ed:  I heard that everybody slept upstairs in that little tiny house. Do you remember that?

Ray:  Oh yah.

Ed:  Did you sleep end for end like head to foot?

Ray: Sometimes. There were three or four of us in one bed ‘cause it was a small house. Course a lot of us were kids and I think there were 4 beds up there in that little upstairs we had ay. So it was pretty crowded. Sure. And then you had to come down. We had a pot down in the living room. So when you had to take a leak or something you had to come downstairs ay to do that. 

Ed:  Whose job was it to dump that?

Ray:  Well it was anybody’s job to dump it. I remember we were burning coal and what I hated so much about coal pails was you had to fill a bunch of coal pails at night so you kept the house warm all night. They would be right there sitting so you could throw some more coal in. My job when I got to a certain age was to fill coal pails. And to break that hard lignite coal with kind of an axe, oh that was a miserable job. Then of course the dirty dust and…

Ed:  Did you have an agreement when you went to bed you’d be quiet, to not make noise or…

Ray:  Sometimes you pull different stuff especially if you have friends over, staying overnight, uh. There was always something going on.

88.  Playing Tricks

Ed:  Tricks?

Ray:  Ya.

Ed:  What kind of tricks?

Ray:  Well,

Ed:  Anything you can tell…

Ray:  Not for sure but just certain things we used to play on ‘em. You know different things you done to play on a person, pull some tricks on ‘em. Oh ya.

89.  Sleeping at ND Homestead

Ed:  Was it divided for sleeping, boys on one end and girls on the other?

Ray:  Well, we didn’t have much of a divide but the girls slept in one kind section of the upstairs and the boys slept in the other section. 113’ Some of the boys got older like James so they were away from home.They kept dribbling off eh, Ya. 

90.  Dreaded Herding Cows

Ray:  And then herding cows, that was something that I dreaded ay. We didn’t have pasture enough so we had to herd cows, run ‘em out in the rain and bring ‘em in, get them water, eh.

Ed:  Did you walk?

Ray:  No, we had an old mare, I think we called her May. She was pretty good because we couldn’t get on her so when she put her head down to eat well we’d jump on her neck and then kick her with our heels, she’d raise her head and then we’d slide back. If you’re a little kid how could you get on a horse? That’s the way we got on. Oh yah, you’re always figuring, even when you’re young, you’ll figure out things. 

Ed:  Just one at a time or did a couple get on …two of you?

Ray:  No, most time it was one at a time. Sometimes there would be three or 4 of us on her.

Ed:  How’d you get three or four on?

Ray:   131’ They kept coming, young kids, small kids. The back of a horse is quite long ay, so you could get quite a few on there. 

Ed:  When you’re up there would you pull them up or how would the rest of them get up, wait till her neck is down?

Ray:  Well sure, 134’ ya, the neck is down and then come up too. 

Ed:  [Giggling.]

Ray:  [Giggling too.] Oh yah you’ll always figure out a way for sure.

Ed:  Would it be all boys or girls,

Ray:  Some are boys and some are girls ya.

Ed:  So then three of you would ride out to herd?

Ray:   for sure. Kind of to keep track because cattle would stray off and get into a crop or something or into houses so that’s why we were to keep ‘em in check.

Ed:  Would you just stay on the horse or get off?

Ray:  Oh no, we’d get off. When the cattle weren’t close to getting into somebody’s crops or water well then we’d play and stake off the horse and the horse would be grazing. Eventually we had to go to work to bring ‘em in. If they were getting into somebody’s field, then we had to go and bring ‘em in. 149’

91.  Ruby - Strict

Ed:  What do you remember about Ruby the oldest? 

Ray:  She was kind of strict anyway. Some of the older ones left home and went on their own. I don’t remember too much about a lot of it but I remember Ruby being quite strict with us.

92.  James

Ed:  What do you remember about the next one, James?

Ray:  When we first came up to this country, James and I worked together so much aye. I was the separator man and we ran around custom threshing and then not only that but when we were breaking land we broke pretty near night and day. I was the one with James so James and I worked a lot together. 164’ He was good to work with.

93.  Geneva

Ed:  What do you remember about the next one Geneva?

Ray:  Well of course Geneva went away when quite young so I don’t have too much about Geneva.

94.  Lola

Ed:  and then the next would be…

Ray:  Lola.

Ed:  Well what do you remember about Lola?

Ray:  Well, really, I don’t remember too much about Lola neither, except I remember when she went to Ryder and married Stuart Ditch. When they moved up to this country and homesteaded, we did a lot more associating you know.

95.  Lola’s place

Ray:  Did you ever see Lola’s place?

Ed:  Ah…Let's see, yes.

Ray:  Oh, you and Dorman were out there today. You looked at Lola’s old log house.   

Ed:  Ya, their house…

Ray:  But their land was just down and its all open now. [no trees]

96.  William

Ed:  What do you remember after Lola? Who is that next?
Ray:  It would be William eh. 181’

Ed:  What do you remember about William when you were little?

Ray:  Well, William, I remember he was pretty hot tempered. One time we were going someplace and he had a model T Ford sedan, no--coupe that’s what is was. I had to do the crankin’ and then the thing would kick, backfire eh, kick back. I finally told him, “I broke my arm, she kicked.” I went in the house and he was cussing out there, “That damn kid can’t do nothing himself.”  They told him why don’t you come in the house and take a look. Here my hand was out of joint. My hand was sticking straight back this way. William wanted to pull on my hand and get it back in place. At that stage I was mad at him anyway. He was bound he wanted to pull so “OK,” I said, Try and pull. Of course he just pulled me right off that bed or cot I was on. I braced my feet over the side for another try and he pulled ‘er back. Yah, he pulled ‘er back in joint. Never went to the doctor and I broke my leg too. 198’ I twisted my foot back myself. Down on the old merry-go-round there were some other young smart alecky kids and we were out getting into a fight ay with these city kids. Us, farm kids didn’t get along with the city kids very good. We got into a scrap on the merry-go-round and I got my toe in between the cleats. You know how the cleats were on the old merry-go-round… That city kid gave me a shove and my toe was sticking straight that way. “Oh gee.” I said. I asked some of the other guys and they wouldn’t touch it so I grabbed it myself 208’ and gave it a good pull. I never went to the doctor for either of them. William fixed one and I fixed my leg myself.

Ed:  I have to ask when William fixed you did he have to tie you to the bed??

Ray:  Well I put my feet against the board on the edge of the bed. I held it pretty good and he gave it a good yank to get it back.  Well it was just back this way so if you give it a pull it will slide back. It slides on the joint you know. 215’ Oh yah we fixed a lot of things at home. Because of my leg it was quite a while before I had to do much work. After that I ran the team and the mower.  I’d hop out on one foot and cut hay and come back. Oh yah, you didn’t get away with much. You still had to work. 220’

Ed:  It must have hurt!

Ray:  Oh it did, oh sure, sure it hurt but what are you going to do? And you had no other way, there weren’t too many doctors. In the early days it was quite a ways to get to a doctor. We didn’t have a very good way to get there so you did so much of that at home. You fixed it at home and we did lots of it. 

Ed:  Were there any medicine to take?

Ray:  Na. Na we didn’t think of that…medicines. No, that was out. Now if they are going to do something with you, they give you a shot. In those days you took your shot.

Ed:  Of whiskey?

Ray:  Oh no. Not in those days. We didn’t have whiskey.

97.  Moonshiners

Ray:  No we didn’t do much drinking but there were a few old moonshiners around the country.

Ed:  Dad [Tom Ostrom] talked about moonshiners. 

Ray:  Oh ya oh for sure. Yah that was quite a thing in those days. 

Ed:  Dad said to make money during prohibition he rebottled whiskey into small bottles called mickeys and sold them at barn dances for a dollar.

Ray:  Oh sure, sure. We had a neighbor down home who used to haul hay to Minot. That’s what he’d do, he would cache the bottles in the hay because they were watching him to search him. He hid them in the hay. 241’

Ed:  And then you’d find ‘em?

Ray:  Well no, but he would sell them to customers in Minot when he got there. You see it wasn’t like now where you can go to a liquor store and buy liquor wherever you want to. In those days it wasn’t ay. But the government figured it was such a good business why don’t they get a cut of it. Now you can go to liquor stores and buy any kind of liquor you want. 247’ So they got their part, the money out of it.

Ed:  My dad and his cousin Harvey said they knew of where a guy hid his booze. They would go and steal some.

Ray:  Well I suppose

Ed:  Did you ever know about anything like that?

Ray:  No, no. But I know of this Joe Holloway. We were looking for a still in the hills but we never found it, I think so. No but it was a way to make extra money, making and selling liquor.

Ed:  Did you do that? 256’

Ray:  No, No. We made liquor that’s for sure.

Ed:  Oh You made it?

Ray:  But we didn’t sell it. 

Ed:  In North Dakota?

Ray:  No.

Ed:  Oh here.

Ray: Here, when we were up here. 258’ Old man Larson was good at making this here beer out of barley. So we learned something. We made some of that. You grow the barley and you get so much, then you had to dry it. There was lots of work to it. Hot water was used, willow sticks in there and you poured water over it and some yeast and there was enough sweetness in it so  you just had to put yeast in it. 264’

       [Note added by Ed.]

   (source: Wikipedia: 10-21-2007

  Prohibition aka the Noble experiment.

  The United States aimed to achieve alcohol abstinence through legal means. The term is also used to denote the era of the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the years 1920 to 1933, during which alcohol sale, manufacture and transportation were constitutionally banned throughout the United States.

  While the manufacture, sale, and transport of alcohol was illegal in the U.S., it was not illegal in surrounding countries. Distilleries and breweries in Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean flourished as their products were either consumed by visiting Americans or illegally imported to the U.S. Chicago became known notoriously as a haven for disobeying Prohibition during the time known as the Roaring Twenties.)

Ed:  Did you bottle it or did you just drink it out of a barrel? 265’

Ray:  Well, most of the time it never got so far as get bottled.

Ed:  Did you dip it out of a barrel? How did you drink it?

Ray: Oh we did. Dip it out of a barrel and then some of it if we had a jug, we would put it in gallon jugs.

98.  Ole

Ed:  271’ OK, who is the next one, what do you remember about the next one, who would that be?  

Ray:  Well, of course Ole we came up here together.

98.1  Oliver

Ray:  Next is Oliver of course. He was back there and died quite young so I don’t remember much about Oliver.

99.  Alice

Ed: What do you remember about my mom Alice? I know she fell down the stairs and split her lip up bad. Were you there then?

Ray: Oh, I suppose I would of , yah. ‘Cause she did get quite a cut and she never did get it completely healed.

100.  Estelle

Ed:  What do you remember about Estelle?

Ray:  You know off hand, I’m sure… Well, I remember herding cows, stuff like that. 287’ She’d be in on that you know. A bunch of us riding on the same horse, herding cows. Oh ya its pretty hard to go back that far.

101.  Ivene

Ed:  What do you remember about Ivene?

Ray:  Not anything special

102.  The twins

Ed:  How about the twins?

Ray:  Well the twins of course they were kind of adored quite a bit. They were the youngest so they were kind of extra. 

Ray:  Yah I think we’ll kind of call it a day.

Ed:  Alright. 304’

103.  Emerson Pot Band

Ed:  Now we’re looking at [photo file] EmPh15. The photo of the Emerson pot band.

Ray:  I’m the drummer on the old tub. We used to have a little, kind of a band with us kids down there. I’m playing on the bottom of a tub, I’m the drummer I guess and Estella, she’s a singing and Alice, I’m just not sure what she is doing. She is sitting there smiling. Yah it is something. You see, kids in the early days could make up their own fun ay.

IMAGE: Emerson Pot Band, Estelle, Alice, Oliver, Ray and
Ivene, circa 1921. Emerson homestead in North Dakota. Photo
from the collection of Edwin J. Ostrom.

104. Emerson Barn

Ray:  Sure and that barn, you know, the old barn, it’s a wonder we didn’t tear it apart. We made that our play place ay. 317’ We did stunts on the rope and a lot of people would come over and watch us ‘cause we were just like cats and mice up there. We’d practice and practice and we got good at walking cables stretched across the barn. Boy, that was our play place down in the barn. That was the best thing we ever had. We’d dig holes in the hay and then we’d play hide and seek. Neighbor kids would come along and couldn’t find you. The cables tied the barn walls together to keep it from collapsing. Hay covered the cables so it was easy to burrow alongside the cables. Oh ya, we had holes all over in this hay just like gophers.

105.  What you’ve done

Ray:  Yah, the human body is pretty strong when you start to think of everything it’s done all these years. 334’ If you piled up in one place all the work that you’d done in all your lifetime, it would be a huge amount for sure.

106.  Band Idea

Ed:   Whose idea was the Emerson band?

Ray:  Oh, it’s hard to tell. It just gets started as kids and it’s hard to tell whose idea it was. This is the way we made our own fun in the early days. 343’ We didn’t have to run around in the country like they do now with vehicles, into everything, a little dope and everything else.

Ed:  Who took that photo?

Ray:  I wouldn’t know.

Ed:  Did your mother or dad have a camera? 

 Ray:  No. It wouldn’t be dad for sure. But it could have been one of the older sisters too, like Ruby or Geneva or James. It likely would have been one of the girls. Would likely have been Ruby or Geneva that took that. They saw what we were doing there and thought it was pretty cute so they took that picture I suppose. The old cameras they had in those days weren’t like the cameras you have now.

Ed:  What sort of music did you play? 357’

Ray:  Music?

Ed:  Did you play?

Ray:  Well we didn’t have any, we made our own music. It was quite a thing back then to play a record on a phonograph. I remember when we first got TV up in this country, well half of the time you couldn’t see a picture and then the other times you’d only hear somebody talking on it. It was very poor. But now they have it so it’s something eh? 

Ed:  So maybe you heard a record and tried to make your band sound like that?

Ray:  Oh I suppose that could be, ya. Cause we did have the record player, the old phonograph ay. We had one of them at home and. 373’ OK, let’s take a break.
Ed:  OK. 374’

107.  Alice & Tommy

Ed:  What else do you remember about Mom [Ray’s sister, Alice]?

Ray:  Sharon and her husband came up and brought your mother Alice and Tommy along with them the year they came up here.  They spent a little time with us. [Ray is struggling, he has a sudden onslaught of the hiccups.]

108.  Emerson Homestead windmill

Ed: That’s quite a windmill next to the Emerson barn.

Ray:  Oh ya. They used that for quite a while. They had an old barn to the west. A big wind storm came up and took the roof off and it hit the windmill about here somewhere and just threw it right over. After that we built a little shed and used a little gasoline engine to run the pump jack. We brought that, that’s up here somewhere, James brought it up here. I don’t know what happened to it.

Ed:  The wind mill?

Ray:  No the little gas motor. That one-horse motor was so heavy you couldn’t pack it hardly. 395’ Look at now, those little motors, you can get a horse power out of it. They were so heavy in the early days. I wish I could find it. It was a little hard to start. I think it was an international. For some reason, I don’t know why, we got it up here, it was sent up here. I think we used it at Ole’s place on some of those old wells we had dug that went dry. We probably threw it down a well and that’s probably where it is now.

109.  Emerson Well, sleeping and farm chores

Ed:  404’ Do you remember that well that you had on your place in North Dakota? Was that hand dug?

Ray:  Oh no, it was dug with a machine, because it was 100 and some feet deep. Oh yah I remember the well. It had a great big round wooden tank that it pumped into. We kept most of our cattle in the barn, especially in the winter time.

Ed:  Did you have to feed the cattle?

Ray:  Oh yah sure. Then milk the cows, feed the cows. We lived in that barn almost, milking, feeding, cleaning and stuff like that.

Ed:  Did you sleep there in the summer?

Ray:  No. We slept in empty granaries in the summer. Us boys slept out there to get more room in the house. I remember some pretty bad storms down in there. They would come up and scare the dickens out of you because you figure it is going to take you and the whole works. 

Ed:  What did you sleep on when you went in the granary?

Ray:  Well we had beds in there I think. ya 429’ 

110.  Sleeping in Canada

Ray:  Probably like when we first come up in this country, we made our mattress. We used these little round poles, that was your springs The three of us always slept in the same bed. I suppose I slept in the middle likely. I was the smallest and then we went and pulled a bunch of old grass and stuff and sewed some sacks together and made a mattress to sleep on ay, cause those round poles aren’t very good to sleep on. 439’ The poles had a little spring in ‘em anyway.  

Ed:  Did you have pillows?

Ray:  Well, I guess we did have some. They were probably pretty black. You could use a coat or anything really under your head. OK. Well take a break.

111.  Hope Ray Tells Stories

Ed:  450’ I’m sitting across from Ray and looking at him. This is Ed. I always wanted to come up and record Ray’s stories because he is the only Emerson boy left and according to the aunties [his sisters] he hasn’t written his stories. I didn’t want to call you up and say, “Oh, I’m going to come up in two weeks and record you,” because I didn’t know if I was going to be here and exactly when so I just waited until I got here. Plus… because maybe you would just be ornery….

Ray:  Oh, well, you know I suppose. You didn’t know that… That I could be an ornery guy, that could tell you to go to heck.

Ed:  [Laughing.]

Ray:  I could have done that, ay. Take your recording and heck with you. [Laughing.] But the only thing I try to do if it means anything to them is to try to co-operate and do the best I can. That’s all I can do. Well, Vivian, she said she’s been after ‘that’ Ray to do his memoirs.

Ed:  And I thought, well. I’ll help do that so you could almost say I drove 4 days…I don’t know how many miles, for nothing. I made that risk but on the other hand it’s not for nothing either even if you wouldn’t have talked cause that would be fine. I was hoping you would talk.

Ray:  Well I suppose, ya. To some people it means a lot.

Ed:  Yah it does.

Ray:  I’m the last of the boys too so who do you go to?

Ed:  Vivian said I want that Ray to write ‘em and I said, Well, maybe I’ll help and then you Ray can edit the writing. So that is my plan. I’ll transcribe these tapes onto paper and then I’ll send them to you so you can say, well I don’t like that or…

Ray:  No….

Ed:  I’ll show you an example of what I’m talking about. 

112.  June brings lunch. 

Ed:  Ray has a photo of him and…Oh, somebody showed up. 489’ Oh, it’s probably June. June, Raymond’s wife, showed up with some food. It’s noon. 

Ed to June: Would you mind just saying who you are?

June:  June Emerson, Raymond’s wife.

Ed:  And Raymond is Ray’s wife. No, wait a minute, I got this messed up. Who is Raymond?

Ray:  My son.

June:   You met, I am Ray’s daughter-in-law. 

Ed:  OK, now I got it. I’m fumbling around here. And what are you doing here?

June:  Just bringing lunch because Ray needs a little food once in a while. He needs to be reminded to eat.

Ed to Ray:  How’s the food?

Ray:  Good. You’ll find that out.

Ed:  Oh I know. I actually had June’s lunch yesterday with Alberta beef and it’s ah grain…ah…

Ray:  Barley fed..

Ed:  What?

Ray:  Barley.

June:  Barley.

Ed:  Barley…barley fed and it was fabulous. Yah, I met June before. I just wanted to give her troubles.

113.  Ruth Larson’s father

Ed:  509’ Ruth Larson’s father was what? What’s his name?

Ray:  Sivert Larson. Then there was a Brent Larson.

Ed:  Were they brothers?

Ray:  Yah, I think they were brothers ya.

Ed:  He was what?

Ray:  Brent, Brent Larson.

Ed:  And then who was the other brother? Do you remember?

Ray:  You know I can’t think of this name right now. I remember working down there for Harry Blum. He lived not too far from him and they had a farm not too far from there, sure. 519’

Ed:  OK, ‘cause I never knew who was Ruth’s father.

114.  On the Train

Ed:  523’ The Larson’s came up in three carloads?

Ray:  They took everything they had [From North Dakota. Larsons were neighbors of the Emerson’s.] But they ended up with some old horse machinery and horses and an odd cow. They came up with that and we helped them move out from Eaglesham to their homestead where they had their land.

Ed:  Is that because the railroad was at Eaglesham? 532’

Ray:  I think the railroad went thru here in 1916.

Ed:  And that’s how you got here?

Ray:  Well, yah we came on the train….

Ed:  You landed.

Ray:  Well then we were in the 20’s ay so the railroad was in here quite a bit early.

Ed:  Oh when you came, the railroad wasn’t here? [the confusion is I thought the railroad extended to Ray’s property. I forgot to ask Ray what type of transportation he used to get the 5 miles from the railroad to his homestead? Did he walk or? from the train and how did he carry his goods and where did he temporarily store it safely from animals or robbers?]  

Ray:  Oh ya, it was here then sure. But there was only a siding. Yah, we came on the train, sure. 

Ed:  You rode the train all the way from Minot or so, all the way up here?

Ray: Ya, ya. And James. I remember when we got further up north here there were lots of trees. The railroad ran thru these bunch of trees. We got to thinking, standing there and looking out the car window, “Gee, wouldn’t that be nice to have a cabin and that sitting in the trees.” Cause back in North Dakota you weren’t used to trees, eh. Oh, we thought that was great to have all those trees with a cabin in there. I guess we never thought, what would we do. We would just live off nothing. Yah. ya.

Ed:  Did you sleep on the train? 554’

Ray:  Oh yah, they had sleepers ay. And lots of guys couldn’t afford a sleeper but then they would just sleep on their seat eh.

Ed:  Was it comfortable?

Ray:  Oh it wasn’t comfortable but…when you get tired enough, anything is comfortable. When you are young, you can sleep standing on your head almost, for sure. Well we’ll eat.

Ed:  OK.

115.  Ole’s log house

Ed:  This is September 13, about 9 o’clock at Ray’s house and 567’ Ray has in his living room a photo of a log barn,

Ray:  A log house.

Ed:  A log house, and a couple horses and a wagon full of…Turnips…Is that right?

Ray:  That’s right.

Ed:  Whose house?

Ray:  That’s Ole’s. That’s the first house. We lived in that together when we first came up here. Well, we lived with Pete Anderson to start with and then we kept building on each other’s place ay. 578’ So that’s Ole’s log house. Frank and Ned are the horse’s names and I’m on the wagon. See the turnips, it’s very full. But then we used to board the road gangs that came thru when they were cutting the road thru. So it took a lot of meals.

116.  Turnips & Cellars

Ed:  Is that what the turnips were for?

Ray:  591’ Well, we cooked and served them to the sawmill people. We always had lots of men around, because they would come in with their logs, and stuff when they were hauling logs.

Ed:  Well, you mentioned the turnips were so nice.

Ray:  Oh they were. In the early years they weren’t wormy or nothing. They were just good, really good. We can’t grow turnips like that anymore.

Ed:  How did you cook the turnips?

Ray:  How do you cook ‘em? Well you just split ‘em and cut ‘em up and boil ‘em until they were done, just like what you do with potatoes pretty well.

Ed:  How would you harvest them?

Ray:  Well, we’d pick ‘em up and let them dry a little and then cut the tops off and then put them in the cellar. In those days we didn’t have much of a basement. There were cellars, ay.

Ed:  Were the cellars rock lined?

Ray:  Oh no, just dirt. It was dirt. You dug a hole in the ground under the house and that was your cellar. Then a little trap door in the kitchen floor or where ever lined up with and step ladder and down you go and get what you wanted. 

Ed:  Did Ole’s house have a cellar? 626’

Ray:  Yah that’s right. That’s where they are going. See there’s a window there to the cellar. We take that window out and dump the turnips right down in there in the bin.

Ed:  Would you stack them or did you put them in bins or…

Ray:  Well, no you just run them in a big bin ay. 

Ed:  Was there a floor or just dirt?

Ray:  It was just dirt, ya. 

Ed:  How big was that cellar?

Ray:  About 12’ x 14’ in Ole’s house or 12’ x 12’ something like that. 

Ed:  Could you stand up in it?

Ray:  Oh yah. We had a trap door in the kitchen floor. You stand up a ladder and go down and get whatever vegetables you want. 

[Ray said he had a frog in his throat and motioned to hold off taping.]

117.  Butchering

Ed:  Ray has a photo. It’s a close-up of him on the right and there are two horses and Elsie is in there with him. What is that?   What is the story on that photo? 656’

Ray:  We had just butchered a beef that day, and we brought up a quarter of a beef. I was going to put it down in the basement. So that’s what I was doing and Elsie was out there too. 664’ We didn’t butcher too many beefs. We would go out and get moose and deer for a lot of our meat in the earlier days but then in later years of course we would butcher our own beef. 

Ed:  Did you do the butchering?

Ray: We used to go together, Ole and Ruth and myself and Elsie. Ole and I cut everything up, ay, in chunks and the two women wrapped the meat. Then we had deep freezers and threw them into there.

Ed:  Did you actually do the killing too?

Ray:  678’ Oh ya. We done all the butchering.

Ed:  How would you do the killing?

Ray:  Well, we would shoot them with a 22.

Ed:  Where?

Ray:  Right in a certain spot so you would make sure you got them in the brain. And then if you missed them a little bit it didn’t work very good.  

Ed:  Did you try to calm them down a little before you shot ‘em?

Ray:  Well, we would put them in kind of a chute ay. And then shoot them there. 688’ I remember I was going to help a couple of the neighbors. They wanted to butcher a beef and they thought there was nothing to it. They thought they could point the gun anywhere and shoot, ay. I told them I didn’t like doing that ‘cause I had shot so many cattle you know for the neighbors. They had shot the animal and of course they shot too low cause you only have a certain spot to get the brain ay and if you don’t get the brain they just don’t die, they just stand there with the blood running out of their nose. Finally I had to grab the gun and…703’  

End of Tape side B dated 9-13-2007; 0’ to end.

I want to thank Cousin Ed and his family for helping to bring these stories to us. This interview with Ed's Uncle Ray has been very informative for not only Ray's recollection of his life with his parents and siblings on the family homestead in Torning Township, Ward County, North  Dakota but we also are gaining insight on the life and efforts to homestead in northern Alberta, Canada. Hope you too enjoyed this post and that you have a good week. See you next time and thank you for stopping by. The next article will conclude Ray Emerson's interview.

-- --  --

The URL for this post is: http://homefolktales.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-emersons-interview-with-ray-part-two.html.

Please comment regarding this post by clicking the URL above and then use the "Comments" link at the bottom of each post. Or contact me by email at dsteff4246[at]gmail[dot]com.

Copyright (c) 2016, Darlene M. Steffens. All rights reserved.