Dave and I headed down the driveway and headed east to our land which was called the Haramsa land. (I don't think I spelled it correctly) The story was there used to be a farm on the hill several hundred yards east of our place. Dad's version was there was a fire which destroyed the buildings and after the fire the family and most of their possessions were never seen again. Was that true? We will never know but it was the story as we grew up and any work we did on the land was always explained that we needed to do this or that on the Haramsa land.
The day had gotten off to a somewhat rocky start. For starters Mom had called us out of a deep sleep to make sure we got to work. As Dave and I stumbled downstairs I was taken aback by the kettle on the propane stove. I knew what that meant. In times of little money Mom was resourceful enough to feed us at every meal. Unfortunately this morning breakfast consisted of soaked wheat berries and then cooked. For the healthy mined I am sure it would be great but for a young boy who savored eggs and bread the wheat was almost a deathblow! Dad was gone, as was often the case, but had left orders with Mom that we were to start plowing the Haramsa field. Dad had planted rye on it in the fall so we had a pretty easy summer on the land. With fall planting it meant that there would be little if any rock picking as the rye would be up early. It also meant that there would not be the once or twice over it early with the drag behind the Ford. We usually had to pick rocks and drag before the crops emerged but with rye it was not the case. What it also meant is there would probably be, at least, several patches of Canadian Thistles to deal with. Those darn weeds ALWAYS matured around harvest time which meant there would be fluffy sticky itchy flowers in the air as we combined the field. If one was lucky and the wind was blowing in your face it would not be bad but if otherwise you could count on flowers in your hair, nose and other unmentionable places.
The Haramsa land was not your "cream of the crop" land. Oh it was plenty fine soil but there were several pot holes, a large shallow hole (maybe where the old house was) and plenty of rises and dips in the land. As I remember it was probably better for hunting ducks than raising crops. For sure it always had a bumper crop of rocks but they didn't sell well at the grain elevator! It did have one redeeming value and that was mid field to the north it had a straggly looking groove of trees BUT in those trees were some of the best chokecherries in the country. They always were ripe about harvest time so all was not lost as we worked the land.
On the north side of the the Haramsa land was our creek. It came from the west, went under the bridge north of our place and then meandered a bit north, then a bit south until it exited on the northeast corner of the land where it headed north towards the east end of Lake Tewaukon. At this time of year the creek was pretty much dry. There may have been a few shallow places where there was a mud puddle but by August the rain water from the south, that fed the creek, had pretty much stopped and the creek looked like a snake that had shed it's skin and was lying dormant for some time. By now the weeds on each side had grown tall and were dry as tinder.
Such was the state of affairs as Dave and I turned our tractors east past the shelter belt and then headed towards the rock pile which bordered the creek for several hundred feet. It was there that we would start plowing the rye field. Dad had talked to us the day before and mentioned that if needed we could burn some of the field as harvested rye fields always had a soft thick layer of straw which could make plowing difficult. If too much straw the plows would plug up and a person would have to stop, get off the tractor and pull the straw out from between the plow lays. We stopped by the rock pile to discuss how to attack the day. We would be plowing east and west and that was the way we combined so we knew that the straw might be an issue. As we surveyed the land we could see that our neighbor, Bert, still had his entire wheat field to cut and harvest. It looked like it could be a bumper crop, perhaps one of the best in several years. The golden heads of wheat waved in the breeze as if to say they were ready to be had. By this time the sun was mid sky to the east and it seemed to show it's golden light on each tiny head of grain. It was a puzzle as to why the field was not yet harvested but then we knew, as well as everyone in the county, that when Bert did his work was dependent on a whole lot of factors and that is not up for discussion.
Dave climbed onto the M tractor and said he would take the first turn east. We would start perhaps a couple hundred yards to the south of our field line. By the time we would get to the edge of our field to the north we would be in the middle of the entire field and that would work well for the south half. Dave got about a hundred feet in and stopped. His three bottom plow was plugged. As I stopped behind him my two bottom plow looked the same. Off the tractor, pull the straw out and then on again. We arrived at the east end of the field after several trips off the tractor to unplug. We turned and headed west towards the rock pile which would take us past the chokecherries and up to the rock pile again. About a hundred feet from the rock pile Dave stopped for the umpteenth time and got off the tractor with a look of disgust and anger on his face. Enough is enough he said as we contemplated how to start a burn of the straw. Always thinking ahead Dave had brought matches with him just in case! It was an easy task to start the tinder dry straw on fire. We sat on our tractors while we decided how to proceed. In short order the fire took off and the flames leapt high in the air. Slowly the smiles on our face changed to fear as the fire quickly gained ground and also made its own wind. We stood as if frozen when the slight breeze from the southwest turning into a wind created by the fire and headed straight towards the creek bed and there, across the creek was Bert's golden wheat field ready to yield him his winters income! We pulled our plows out of the ground and drove ahead of the fire to the north. By putting our plows in the ground ahead of the fire on the north we intended to stop it but to no avail. Again we got ahead of the fire and again we put the plows in the ground and attempted to plow a dirt path that would stop the fire. Our second dirt path stopped most of the fire but some jumped the path and flared up. As I tried to put it out Dave took the M tractor and tried to make a third dirt path. Each time we inched closer to the dry tinder of the creek bed and as that happened it also inched closer to Bert's field. Finally, after the fourth dirt path had stopped most of the fire, but not all, we took off our tattered T shirts and were able to smooth the last of the flames. As we stood panting and sweating near our field line and the creek bed we looked at each other and let reality set in. IF that fire had jumped the last dirt path and hit the creek bed Bert's wheat field would have been history and perhaps we would have too!
A way to close call and a lesson learned. Of course Dad never did hear about it and why should he have? For the next few days it was plow, unplug, plow, unplug as slowly, oh so slowly the golden rye straw turned to a rough plowed field with shafts of brown straw sticking up almost like a bad hair day. A disaster averted and a life lesson in fire all combined into a day on the farm. I guess one could say that what happens in the field stays in the field.
