Don, in his retirement years, bought a personal computer and took a
writing class at the Coon Rapids, Minnesota Senior Center. Here is his
account of life in Iowa, written ca 1991:
Life In Shenandoah
We moved to Shenandoah, Iowa from Jackson, Minnesota in 1915 where my
father worked as an automobile mechanic for Piper Motors.
One thing I remember was the streets were paved with wooden brick and
after a heavy rain the bricks would swell, pop out of place and would
wash down the street. Later after the bricks dried out a city work
crew were busy hauling them back to replace them.
My Mother told of a time when I was about four years old, we were out
for a stroll with Mother pushing little Harry in the buggy with Milton
and I walking along we met an elderly lady walk toward us. I stopped
in front of this lady and remarked, "Whose Grandma are you?"
She said, with a big smile, "I am little Mary May's great grandma."
Mary May's father was Earl May, owner of the Earl May Seed Company.
The Earl May Seed Company, not to be out done by Henry Field and radio
station KFNF also started radio station KMA in Shenandoah.
In the fall of 1917 we moved to Clarinda Iowa where my father went to
work for Fred Driftmier in a tire and battery store. Mrs. Driftmier
was a sister of Henry Field. In later years she started the Kitchen
Klatter program on KFNF radio station that was owned by the Henry
Field Seed Co. in Shenandoah.
In the early 1920's Henry was always selling his seeds on the radio
and after he had been talking quite a long time so Milton thought the
sales pitch was a little long, stood in front of the radio speaker and
shaking his fist toward the speaker said, "Come out and fight like a
man!" at Henry's remarks.
The Berry Seed Company in Clarinda also built a radio station KSO.
In 1926 a tornado hit Clarinda destroying
thirty homes, removed part of the roof and one transmitting tower from
the Berry Seed Co. So after the station was back on the air the
County Agriculture agent was giving a lecture on flies. He stated
that there was the fruit fly, the horse fly and the house fly. But in
last June there was also a radio station fly (from the tornado).
In February 1927 I was hired to deliver the Clarinda, Iowa, Journal,
a twice weekly newspaper. I was thirteen at that time. The first
day, as the previous carrier quit the route, I had to find the subscribers
from the address printed on each paper. I also was not familiar with
the southwest section of Clarinda although I knew the street names
there. To top it off, being February, it was raining heavily. If it
had been in Minnesota with the colder temperature it would be a
blizzard. It took me three days to complete the first trip and then
to start all over again the next day taking about three hours. This
route had one subscriber who lived a block south of the Berry Seed
Company's plant, just outside the city limits without sidewalks,
graveled, or paved streets.
Don C. Parkins
Coon Rapids, Minnesota
1991
The Day the Sky Turned Green
It was a warm still day on June sixteenth in nineteen twenty six. My
brothers and I were out in the yard when Milton looked at the sky that
had developed a strange green color. We called to our mother just as
it started to rain with the wind whipping through the trees. She told
us to head for the basement and followed us there.
Then we heard a loud noise as though a train was coming toward our
house with the wind and the rain beating against the house.
When the rain stopped we came out of the basement and started looking
around the yard as there were tree branches leaves, and other deris
scattered about the yard. As we walked around the yard I discovered
part of another garage roof in the alley next to our garage that had
came from the Griswald farm, the first buildings to be struck by the
twister. All the buildings on their farm were destroyed.
Two tornados had hit their farm as a "hedge apple" hedge on the edge
of their farm had two large portions torn out of the ground.
Being inquisitive we started south toward our friends house
discovering that nothing was left of their house and that they had ran
down the road, lying down in the ditch, had excaped the storm without
getting injured.
Mrs. Griswald had tried to call us to come out and help pick
strawberries but her line was busy, as most farm lines were, with a
dozen or more subscribers on a farm line in the twenties. Otherwise
we could have been in that ditch also in the rain.
Mr. Griswald, the county farm agent, was in Shenandoah twenty miles
away, when the storm came roaring across the farm. Hearing that the
tornado had destroyed the south part of Clarinda he rushed home
expecting to find his family badly injured, with deaths reported from
the storm.
When He arrived home, finding his family okay, Mrs Griswald started
to cry and stating that "Every thing was gone!" His reply, "Every
thing was there," because she and the five children were safe and
unhurt.
Mrs. Griswald had just finished canning over a hundred quarts of
strawberries and they were blown away in the storm, even if they had
been carried to the basement they would have been destroyed as
everything in the basement was sucked out by the tornado.
rev-4/91 dcp
