Easter at the chicken coop palace ！
In the old days not everyone had a phone. When a family’s parents decided they needed to see a cousin or other relative, they simply packed everyone up and took the old truck or the wagon (pulled by a horse) piled it high with children, quilts, sandwiches and jugs of water, whatever else was needed, and headed off.
When such a group arrived at one’s home, they were welcomed. Extra food was always on hand (in the way of half-gallon blue mason jars full of canned fruits, vegetables and meats) and it was just taken for granted that they may be at least overnight guests. The floor always supplied beds for the children.
Perhaps Uncle Henry knew how to fix a certain farm implement or Aunt Glade was in need of a bobbin for her old treadle Singer and people from that era were always ready to share what they had (Aunt Glade had a certain way of making strawberry jam so the fruit always tasted like it had just been picked, especially for you).
Shortly after the Depression a migration of sorts headed north. My grandparents were part of this settlement and Grandpa Slone’s cousin just knew when my grandparents and their 10 children arrived in Michigan they might have to ‘put them up’ for a spell.
Before long an old farm came on the market. It was cheap and could be had for one who wanted to work it off because all the buildings except the chicken coop and the old toilet had burned many years ago.
The Slones, with the help of a relative who had moved north earlier, settled into the chicken coop. They lived there for 30 years before they finally built a small house on the property.
People lived closer to the land back then and because so much had been lost during the Depression, this coop quickly became a palace. Rooms were partitioned off; bunk beds were made and built from wood on the property; a kitchen and living room were set up (with Grandma and Grandpa’s bed in one corner) and the basement under the chicken coop became headquarters for Slone’s Nursery.
Grandpa secured a job at one of the nurseries in the area that sold all kinds of trees, vines, plants and seeds. Whenever the owner of the nursery discarded wilted or withered nursery stock, Grandpa brought it home to Grandma who, with her Indian background, knew a great deal about reviving such things. Before long Slone’s nursery began selling these rejuvenated plants; the Slones were in business competing with the place where Grandpa was working and Grandpa was out of a job.
Today all this seems primitive; back then it felt like God was shining a light on the family’s future.
Before Grandpa died he began writing me letters telling all about his early years. How much was a figment of his imagination I don’t know. However, I do know the story of the chicken coop was real. When I was a little girl, Easter was always spent at the chicken coop home where colored eggs were hidden among the holly hocks that surrounded the place.
The old, long arbor with its grapevine covering offered shade for some log benches Grandma had built. The adults would sit on those benches and laud our children’s discovery whenever we’d find an egg.
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Post time: Apr-13-2020
