THE LADIES PAGE

heavy for threshing, so Milford set July 22nd and that day was
ideal. We had a wonderful time as we always do when we go to their
threshing day.

On July 14, Mrs. Ray Ernst, of Wayland, Iowa, asked me to send
you a little poem which I wrote for the Reese Reunion. She thought
you might like to use it in the women’s section of the ALBUM.
Now, it was read on the program that afternoon by Homer Wood, R. R.
5, Jacksonville. His reading put more into the lines because he
expressed it perfectly.

Feel free to do just as you please about using it. If you want
it, you are certainly welcome … if not, that is all right and the
copy can just go on file. I have done several poems but this is the
first one on this subject, so you see it is indeed, most
amateurish, but fun.

You see, I too, live with a steam engine ‘bug’, and one
of the most ‘dyed-in-the-wool’ fans who ever put a hand to
the throttle! He worked with his father on an old time
‘Threshing run’ from the time when he was old enough to go
along. So, you see. we live steam engines most of the time.

We live near the railroads, New York Central and B&O (they
cross at the end of the block, about 150 feet from, our house) and
the few steam engines which still run occasionally on the B&O
… he watches them all the way until they are out of sight. When
the diesels go through, one glance and their million
faults’

One of the engineers who asked me for a copy of the poem, wanted
to know how in the world I knew just how an engineer feels … and
that only a person who has handled an engine COULD POSSIBLY know so
well … for so many years I’ve lived it, I’d have to catch
the spirit of the engineer or admit to being deaf, dumb and blind.
If we marry engineers then we must be ‘engineeresses’ if we
want to be happy.

Hope to see you at Pontiac enjoyed my visit with you there last
year. You see so many people, you may not remember me, but I’ll
introduce myself again.