By Floyd Martin
I have been going to rest homes and schools for many years in California , Minnesota , and Texas trying to pass on things that helped me in life, that may add value to the lives of others. The more we know about this wonderful world we live in, the more we will understand the value in life.
Our school in Minnesota had two doors, one for girls only and one for boys only. We had two out-houses, one for girls and one for boys. It did not say boys and girls. There was a moon shape cut out on the girls’ door and a star shape cut out on the boys’ door. I have treasured memories of seeing rabbits, pheasant, deer and lots of game as we drove to school.
Our teacher was 20 years old and it was her first teaching job. She rode a pony to school. She taught all 8 grades, 32 students in that one room. She got big pay $60.00 a month because she did all janitor work with the help of the children. We all got Christmas cards from her each year until she was 97 years old. As we entered the school, each of us had to be inspected for frost bite. To thaw out frost bite, you put snow on it.
One story I told them was how we went to school in a bobsled three miles in very cold weather. I still have the bearskin gloves my brother, who was 12 years old, wore to keep his hands warm while driving the horses. We used to heat the flat irons Mother ironed clothes with and wrapped them in towels to keep our feet warm.
We used to get blizzards so bad we called them white outs. The only way you could go from the house to the barn was to tie a rope from the house to the barn and hang onto it so you wouldn’t get lost. One day at noon, the teacher dismissed school as a storm was coming in. By the time the horses were hitched to the sled, you couldn’t see the driveway into the school. My father told all us children what to do if this happened. Our horses had sleigh bells on them. Dad said to let the horses take you home, that they had a built in knowledge to stay on the road, and bring you home no matter how bad it gets. My dad was standing on the front porch listening for the sleigh bells. When he heard the bells, he rushed into the house to tell Mother that we had made it home.
