Marriage and farming

Then in the fall I went with Olga and Kolja Fast to a German dance. When we stepped out of the bus, I saw a dollar on the sidewalk and said that meant luck. We used the dollar to take a taxi back home. At the dance, we met Greta Martynes and her two brothers, Gerhard and Wilhelm. We became acquainted and danced together. The next year in the fall, Wilhelm Marynes came to Winnipeg where his two sisters lived. On my birthday, the 20th of November, we became engaged. Together we drove to my parents on the farm.

Then he came again in February and stayed for a month in Winnipeg. On June 18, 1938, we were married. Bishop Johann Klassen, who was troubled with eczema couldn’t be there because the church was decorated with flowers. Bishop Enns has a very serious and meaningful homily . After the service, we had a meal in a hall. My white dress had a long train and I had a long veil edged with lace. The headress was a garland of dark green myrtle leaves with tiny white blossoms here and there. I carried a bouquet of pale pink roses and lily of the valley.

The meal consisted of rolls filled with ham, cheese and other things. Then there were cakes, cookies and coffee. We had invited 150 guests and most of them had come. In the evening, there was a dance in the hall with piano music. And with that, the beautiful festive day was over.

Then we moved to the farm near Maymont, Saskatchewan. The farm was seven miles from the town. Willi had rented a three-quarter section. He had nine horses, three cows and implements to work on the farm.

The house was old but after we had wallpapered and painted it, it looked quite cozy. We had enough furniture. We had potatoes that Willi had planted in the spring. However, it didn’t rain that summer and we had a total crop failure. There was nothing to cut or to thresh. The horses and cows were put in the fields and they ate whatever there was.

Now, what should we do? We had no grain, no money and winter was coming on. I told him I would go to Saskatoon for the winter and work as a domestic, and that I’d return in  the spring and we would start to farm again. However, Willi wouldn’t hear of it. He went with his brother Peter to an auction where he bought a cow that they were planning to butcher for meat for the two families. But when he milked her, she produced a whole pailful of milk. So we kept her for that purpose. I made butter and sold it in exchange for groceries. Willi sold another calf and we managed quite well during that winter. In the spring, the government loaned us seed wheat at one dollar per bushel, as well as oats and we began to seed the land. That year, we had a crop yielding 15 bushels to the acre. Wheat was priced at $0.25 per bushel, but we had seed grain as well as feed.

We saw our neighbors frequently. I had become quite at home there. And so the years flowed on. In 1940, on the 15th of December, we had our boy, Wilhelm Helmut. He too was a strong, healthy baby and grew quickly. 

My father had a serious heart attack and we went to Manitoba that summer. We made a good vegetable garden and Willi built a chicken coup and a brooder house for the baby chicks. Then in 1941, we had a crop yielding 25 bushels to the acre and grain had a better price. I bought chicks in the spring and they flourished so we could ship eggs in the winter. Then we bought a Chevrolet car in the fall. My father died on December 30

In 1942, our Sigrid Louise was born on January 25. That summer we went again to Manitoba. We saw our father’s grave. The trip in the new car was good.

Then in 1944, one of our neighbors asked if Bill (Willi) would like to rent his two-quarters section land. Bill did this and in that first year we had a very good crop. This gave our operation a real boost. That year, Mother, David and Nick came to see us for the first time. Our protective hedge that we planted around the farm was growing well. It looked good. Wiki, who liked to build, had built several buildings. That summer, Anjuta (Bill's sister) also came to visit us.

So, we farmed. The price of wheat got better and we always had crops. Gradually, we paid for our land. Then in 1947, my brother Albert came to us as a worker. Quite unexpectedly, we had an opportunity to buy another farm in the close proximity of Maymont.  There were two good barns and a good house. Willi took the opportunity and we moved immediately. Again that year, we had a complete crop failure. It was so difficult to reap the meager crop. The cattle became so thin. Marianne and young Bill started to go to Maymont School that was decidedly better than the school near our other farm.

In his free time, Willi was always building. So we had sixteen buildings on our original farm. Albert had helped with the moving of a barn at another place just before he came to us, so he knew how to do it. So Willi and Albert began to move the buildings from the first farm to the new farm. I was amazed how they could move a building with the tractor in a day, and the two very small buildings they could move in a day. So our second farm was set up with all the necessary buildings. Again in 1948, we had a crop failure. Those years were hard. Then in ‘49, we had a crop again. That was such a relief! On this farm there were two quarter sections of pasture, and there was water there as well, so we were able to keep a lot of cattle that brought us quite a good income. Also at the barn we had a well operated by an electric pump. It was easy then to deal with the livestock on the farm. I also had turkeys that I bought in the summer and sold them in the fall. So the operation of the farm became better and better. The children learned well at the school.

We bought a second big combine, a second tractor and a large truck to deliver the grain. We went several times to Winnipeg and my relative came to visit us. Hans and Lisa Neufeld and their daughter Luise came to see us one summer. Also, we went to Ontario with the whole family. And Willi’s siblings visited us too.

Once in the winter when we had delivered livestock to Saskatoon, a blizzard came up that had not been announced on the radio. We came to where seven cars were already stuck in the snow and several men were attempting to pull them out with a tractor. But the blizzard was too strong and they had to give it up. We were told that we should leave the keys in the car and walk to town. We did that since the town was quite close by. There we went to the garage to warm up. Then Mr. Lepp came and took us to his home. Our clothes were wet. So the Lepps gave us their dry clothes and ours were dried out by the stove. Also they gave us a warm meal. We had to wait until evening for the train to take us to Maymont. By that time the storm was over. We phoned home and Bill answered. How glad Sigrid and Bill were to know that we were in Maymont. They had gone to school in the truck but when the storm came the students were sent home. They came to the road that leads to our farm but there the snow dunes were so big they couldn’t go any further, so they left the truck on the highway and walked home. They brought the calves into the barn. We had to walk from the station to the highway where Billy came to pick us up with the truck, but on the road leading to the farm there were so many snow dunes that we were obliged to walk when we came to them.

As a large waterhole was dug near our farm, and as we had plenty of water, we had a small motor pump the water to a hose line and we watered our garden in this way. We produced very good vegetables.

One day the phone rang. It was my next-door neighbor, “Have you seen the fire?” she asked. “Fire! Where?” “On your farm” she said, “My husband and his brother have already left with the tractor in order to help.” I ran out and to my great shock, I saw a large bank of smoke in the west. The neighbor to the west of us had set fire to some stubble and the fire had crossed over from his land.

I took the car and drove quickly to the corner where my neighbors had come with their tractor. Willi was working on our other farm nine miles away. One of the men told me that exactly 25-years-ago where our farm was presently located, a fire had destroyed the farm. That was no comfort to me! I said I would go to get Willi. “Well, what would he do?” he said. “He would plow a protective furrow.” “We could do that too,” he said. However, I felt as if I should get Willi, so that he could see what was happening here. The fire was close to our farmyard. But I didn't know that on the road leading to the highway, the fire had crossed the road and that the neighbors had come by way of the summer fallow field. I drove away by way of the road.  Soon I was in an absolutely thick dark smoke cloud.

Now I couldn’t go back. I made sure that all the widows were closed. I felt that if I held the steering wheel, steering straight ahead I might be alright and hoped that I wouldn’t get off the track. Just the same, I knew that the car could explode at any time but I remained calm and held the wheel. The way was  ¾ mile long. Suddenly everything was clear and I saw the road perfectly. But soon I was in the dark again, but I got through and no damage was done. I drove fast and picked up Willi. When we came closer to the farm he wanted to go on the road again. I said, “I can’t do that another time. I’ll jump out of the car. Don’t do it, you will burn to death.” So, we took another road and came to the men who had plowed a protective furrow that had held the fire back. They had been certain that I had died in the fire and were trying to decide how to give Willi the news. They were so surprised when they saw me, how I had survived that fire. Without the Lord’s protection I would probably not have survived.

In 1951, we sponsored our sister-in-law, Isaak Martins’ widow and her two daughters to come from Brazil. The oldest stayed with Anjuta, Willi’s sister in Ontario. She was a doctor and needed a housekeeper. So Mika kept house for her. Mariechen, our sister-in-law, got a job in a home for invalids. Hermine, the youngest, stayed with us for a year and then she could live with her mother.

In 1956, my sister-in-law, Dr. Anna Martins had a serious heart operation. It took a long time for her to recuperate. However, she did work for a while after that.