In the early 1900s, a young man named Frank Joseph
Feldman, unhappy with his home life in Morrison,
Illinois, borrowed money from his mother and purchased
1/2 section of land and homestead in the area of
Spring Coulee. He paid the Hudson's Bay Co. $30.00
per acre for the original land package, which was the
going price of land at the time. By 1917 Frank repaid
his mother, and then bought another 1/4 section in 1919.

Frank's younger brother, John came to live with him, so
he put an ad in the Lethbridge paper for a housekeeper.
A young, pretty girl named Margaret (Maggie) Hunter,
who had immigrated from Ireland several years before
and was living in Macleod, applied for the job in 1916
and a year later the two were married.

By the year 1918, the couple had a girl, who currently
lives in Joliet, Montana, and in 1925 another girl,
who lives in Hamilton, Montana.

We raised geese, pigs, chickens a few cattle and
horses which were used to do all the farm work.
We sold many geese to some Jewish families in
Lethbridge, and I'll never forget how nauseated
I would get when my dad would stick a goose with
a knife to bleed the poor creature and it would
slowly collapse as it's life blood drained away.
The other meat we raised for our own use.

Threshing machines would go from farm to farm
to harvest the wheat, which was the main crop in
this area. Some of the wheat would be stored in
our sheds, but the biggest part was taken to the
elevators in Spring Coulee and Magrath.

During harvest season it was up to the farm women
to feed the crews of workers. The woman would
prepare bounteous meals of fried chicken, ham,
roast beef accompanied by lots of mashed potatoes
and gravy, carrots, cabbage slaw, cakes and pies.
There was always plenty of home-made bread and
jellies on the table. Fruit was scarce as well as
expensive and the vegetables grown locally were
sparse. The harvesters would come in with
astronomically big appetites. I remember one
young man who mistook the bowl of gravy for soup,
and it was half gone before mother had a chance
to stop him.

In the fall, we could hear flocks of geese flying
south, visiting and counselling each other. At
night there were coyotes howling their lonesome
cries. Every once in a while dad would have to
get out his twenty two and kill a visiting skunk, and
there was a problem with weasels which would
wreck havoc with our chickens. Badgers were quite
common in our area, too and were known to attack
cars-ripping at the tires with their sharp teeth.

Indoor plumbing was something we read about in
books. The commode under the bed was a common
necessity and the little outhouse too far from the
house in the winter and too close to the house
in the summer was part of every homestead.

The water on our land was alkaline, so all our
drinking water had to be hauled in huge wooden
barrels from somewhere else. A windmill pumped
water for the cattle and horses, and every day in
the winter dad would have to hack holes in the
ice so the stock could drink.

There was a coulee with quick-sand on our land.
A story circulated that a whole team of horses was
sucked into the mud in this place. My parents
swore the story was true, so we never went near
the soggy looking area.

Farmwomen worked very hard. Mother even wheeled
me in my baby buggy out to the field one year when
she had to help dad shock grain. She washed
clothes on an old washboard. In the winter she would
bring clothes in off the lines and they would be frozen
stiff as boards. Water was heated in a resevoir built
onto our stove. She had an old sewing machine and
got as much pleasure out of a few yards of new
material as we do out of a new ready made garment.

Trips to Lethbridge were a big event. We would drive
two or three times a year (yes, we did have a car, one
of the first in that area) to this city and have dinner
in a restaurant, have a ride on the trolley, buy some
fruit, bing cherries, apples, plums and oranges, (I
don't remember every having a banana) and go to
the music store. My dad liked music so we usually
bought one or two records to play over and over
again on our old Victrola.

My memories of school are still quite vivid, although
we left Spring Coulee when I was eight. We started
our education in a tiny school house with one row
of seats arranged to each grade, and there were
either six or eight rows. In September my parents
brought me to town to enroll, and my tears flowed
uncontrolledly when I found out the Ist grade row
was filled. We returned in January and I was able
to start.

My joy was short-lived, however, as the school was
quaranteened by the authorities as a communicative
disease had broken out, probably measles, and that
ended the school year.

In the winter, we rode to school in a sleigh, our
knees covered with a burly bearskin rug. Often
the snow was so deep we could ride over the
fences which were drifted in.

There was a little store in town, which sold the
most delicious penny candy. My little friend, whose
father ran the local blacksmith store, and I would
painstakingly ponder over each penny we spent
on each delectable piece.

The farm was rented to Glen Gilchrist in 1926 and
to Margaret's brother, James Hunter and his wife
Lizzie in 1929. Frank's health was starting to fail
and he could not handle the hard work any more.
The beautiful mountains, lush fruit trees and
warmer climate of Hamilton, Montana lured him
and there he lived until his death in 1935.
Margaret died in 1987.

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