Book 2 - Nathan, Amy, Madison and Ethan Berga

The Big House
written by Joyce Alton Wada
The back porch was the entry into the house
for everyone. Summer produce from the garden was
gathered and sorted in the fall. Inside the house was
a hallway with jacket hooks and a place for boots. A
door opened into the kitchen from the hallway.
The small kitchen was a hub of activity for Lena
many hours each day. Lena was a master of the old
iron wood-stove and accustomed to cooking without
a temperature gauge. Everything she cooked was perfection.
She put several loaves of bread pans on the
shelf on the top of the stove to rise twice a week. They
were uniformly perfect. The smell of yeast filled the
house. Until there was plumbing, a small pump near
the sink was used to drain the water from the sink.
A mirror was above the sink
where the men shaved and
combed their hair.
The top of the iron stove
was used for heating water
for all purposes. Hot,
steamy water was used to
do laundry in the kitchen
on a scrub board and hung
in the second floor porch to
freeze. Later when the wringerwasher
was added in the basement, along with the hot
water heater, the clothes were hung there to dry. In
the summer the laundry was carried up stairs from the
basement and hung outside on ropes between trees.
Laundry was not done frequently, and less frequently
in the winter. Heavy iron flats with wooden handles
were heated on the stove to iron clothes. Doing laundry
would take all day and was an arduous chore.
Lena was very resourceful and grew a large vegetable
garden near the apple orchard, where she picked apples
for her pies. During threshing season as many as
a dozen neighbor men were fed each day around the
dining room table. Coffee was taken to them in the
fields between meals. The men traveled from one farm
“I never heard a cross word from either of my
parents. No rough language, not a mean word,
nor swearing. It was a constant peacefulness
and never complaining about anything. I really
value this. My brothers and grandfather
were always like that.” Helen Barnstable
46
to the other using William’s Threshing machine which
was driven by a belt.
Breakfast consisted of pancakes, bacon, hash brown
potatoes, hot cereal, toast, and other stout foods, especially
in the very cold winter. William’s cereal bowl
was always filled to the top with oatmeal, barely leaving
room for the cream.
The small pantry off the kitchen stored pans, dishes,
and food. The shelves went from floor to ceiling. There
were leftovers, such as small, white cookies, left over
pancakes, homemade jams, and other snacks, plus a
pitcher of milk. Small family meals were served in the
kitchen.
The dining room was a glorious
room with its’ Maple
flooring, door and window
casings. The door from the
kitchen, the alcove from the
living room, the open archway
to the stairway, and
another archway into William’s
room, gave the room
a feeling of grandness. A
large window in the dining
room looked out to the back yard. A window seat,
spanning three windows, occupied the long western
wall, with a view across the driveway and toward the
old house, garden and fields. Between these windows,
in the corner, was the heavy, wooden buffet where
the good dishes were kept. The clock, with its’ small
Marble columns sat on the top shelf of the buffet. At
the same time each week, William, would wind the
clock. The sweet, soft chimes would delicately tell the
hour and half-hour throughout the house. Along the
opposite wall was the heavy, wooden black-leather
settee. Near William’s room was a glider-rocker. On
Sunday, The focal point of this dining room, was the
huge, heavy wooden, oval table with matching high
back wooden chairs. On the table spread a long,
white table cloth, white cloth napkins, white dishes,