3510 Laurel Dr. Holiday, FL 34690
Just a note about green straw stacks. My father was a thresher
and I went with him two years as water boy and blower boy. When we
were at the end of a job, Dad was always there to tell me to get it
off the stack. He always finished with slower speed. I remember
once we were threshing with an Aultman-Taylor machine, barn
hurt, went around, got right back on, and no one knew I had fallen
off.
One thing I never liked was when someone would throw a rotten
egg at you. One time we lost a soft plug in the 22 HP Peerless. Dad
pulled fire, put some boards in, and I had to crawl in the firebox
and replace the plug.
I remember one time the man stacking straw was smoking a corncob
pipe. I ran and told Dad. He shut right down. I remember also at
that same place, during the first World War, the pickers in the mow
were Bloomer girls, and we never had green stacks.
I was the first president, for four years, of the New York Steam
Engine Show, which I named the ‘Pageant of Steam’. I came
to live in Florida in 1968.
