Hands of a Farmer

Today when I looked down at my hands I thought they looked like hands of a farmer. As I was growing up in Wauseon, Ohio I spent alot of time on my Uncle Ed's farm. Uncle Ed had a huge farm at Tedro, Ohio. My two older sisters Janny and Neddy and I use to go and play in the old, red, wooden barn. We would climb the wooden ladder to a loft and jump down into the haymow. When we were outside, we would play hide and go seek between the miles and miles of six foot high, bright green stalks of corn. The edges of the leaves on the corn were so sharp, they could cut you. When our cousins were there, they would play with us. There was a big wind mill near the barn with a pump hooked to it. As the wind blew and turned the wind mill the pump would pump water for the coldest drink you have ever had. So cold it would make your teeth ache. When you went into the farm house, Aunt Grace had tables of baked goods waiting for you. It smelled so good. There were pies and angel food cakes made from scratch. Dough that was rooled flat waiting to became noodles. Fresh bread and cookies were to be found there as well. While we munched on a cookie we would play the handmade wooden marble game. It had a box on the top where you put the marbles before they went down the shoot that went back and forth and back and forth to the bottom, where the marbles were caught, so you could do it again. This game was about three feet tall and four feet wide. We loved it. It was fun to go there. When I was ten years old, Aunt Grace baked me a three tiered, angel food birthday cake. She put it on a round mirror and decorated it. I remember it well, because, it was so beautiful and it was the only birthday cake I ever had.
I remember well what my Uncle Ed's hands looked like. They looked like hands that had done alot of work. The palm was wide, giving plenty of room for his long, wide, strong fingers. I wondered what stories they would tell, if they could talk. They were interesting and capable looking.
The hands of this family goes back to Schaffausen, Switzerland. They came to this country to find a good place to farm. It was 40 days on a ship and many weeks in the wilderness to find their land. They settled at Elmira, Ohio. They had a big farm where they raised their nine children. Six of these children were my uncles. My mom was one of the three girls. Uncle Jim died in China of smallpox. He was vaccinated before he took his family and went there. My mom was a school teacher in a one room school house in Archbold, Ohio. The rest of the children lived nearby. Many of these Spenglers are buried on Lauber Hill. A small grave yard and church on a hill, near Elmira, Ohio. The Laubers were another family that came from Schaffhausen at about this same time.
When our children were in high school, I took two of them to visit Schaffausen. We went to the courthouse to read the names of our family in their book of records. We saw the beautiful Swiss farms with the house, barn and compost pile all in one structure. The compost pile was as big as a single car garage. There would be someone standing on top of it, turning the steaming compost with a pitch fork. As beautiful as this was, it lacked the miles of flat farm land Ohio provided. This is what my hands reminded me of today when I was sitting on my back porch swing at dawn. I have the hands of a farmer. They reach all the way back to my ancestors in Schaffausen. This is the richness of life my family has been fortunate enough to inherit. Gott sei dank. God be thanked. Cara and Gypsy