2007 Year in Review

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The Summer of 1936

Several people have shared their memories with me of the winter of 1936, but they say, “What about the rest of the year?” Well, it seems that after what they put up with during the winter, the rest of the year should have been a breeze--but it wasn’t.

By March the snow was melting, and the weather was pretty normal. The fields were wet, but the farmers could see all of that moisture being stored in the ground and the water table being replenished. Then another problem arose. Farmers at that time were using their own corn for seed; use of hybrid corn was just starting. Farmers would chose ears from the fall harvest to be dried and stored for use as seed in the spring.

It seems that a killing frost on October 6 and minus 24 degree cold during the winter had left much of the seed sterile. The feeling was that the farmers could find enough good corn to get by, but it was definitely a problem.

Things went pretty well until 4:30, Sunday afternoon, May 17, 1936. What the local newspapers described as probably the worst hail storm ever reported hit Morrison. Heavy rain and high winds accompanied the hail. The intense storm was only about two miles wide and extended from the bluffs on the west to about McCue Corners on the east. Steiner Greenhouses reported 1200 square feet of glass broken. Many houses in the city had windows broken. Harold Mathew at Round Grove had 29 broken windows in his home. Telephone and power lines were down throughout the area.

June brought the chinch bugs. An all-out effort was made to try and control them. It seems that it worked. By June an article in the paper said that the threat was gone, and it was a mystery why the insect pests had disappeared so quickly. Those of us who can remember know they would be back in coming years.

Then we hit July with the heat and the grasshoppers. The July 13 Whiteside Sentinel said, “Worst Heat Ever Recorded Goes On.” The story went on to say that the temperature hit 107 and had set new records for three consecutive days with no end in sight. The story added that Whiteside farm crops were withering under the heat, and small grain was being “cooked.” It was reported that the corn crop had already received 25% damage and would probably get worse. But, the insects were thriving!

In the July 17 issue of the Sentinel Farm Advisor Frank Shuman was quoted as saying that this was the worst grasshopper outbreak known in this area. Demonstrations were set up to try and cope with the situation. This was, of course, before the use of field sprayers and insecticides. Farmers were advised to mix 100 lbs. of bran, 2 gallons of cheap molasses, 8 gallons of water, and 4 lbs. of Paris green.

The farmer was to spread this mixture on the ground at daybreak, before the grasshoppers got down off the corn and out of the fence rows to feed on the ground. People were warned not to use arsenate of lead instead of Paris green, because it only made the insects sick and did not kill them. And you think farming is complicated today!

We weren’t quite done with this savage summer. On September 19, we had a rain storm that dumped between two and three inches of rain onto the area with high winds. There was flooding, and farmers reported that much of their corn was blown down.

Well, that was 1936. The crops were poor. The Great Depression was still with us. The Dust Bowl clouds appeared every once in awhile. But life went on, as always, with the hope that the future would be better. You know it was!

by Orville Goodenough, Guest Columnist
March 15, 2007

 

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