Little Chicks Announce The Arrival of Spring

 

The phone fastened to the wall near the kitchen door was ringing, one long ring and three short rings.  My mother got up from the kitchen table to answer.  This was our ring on the party-line. She said, “hello,” listened for a bit, and said, “thank you.” She hung the receiver on its little hook on the left side of the telephone. “It was the depot agent,” my mother said.  “Our chicks arrived on the train this morning, and we should come and pick them up as soon as possible.”

 Each spring my mother ordered chicks from a hatchery in southern Wisconsin.  Usually, 100 White Leghorns and 25 White Rocks.  The former to replace laying hens and the latter to be butchered in the fall and sold.

After the barn chores were done, Pa and I drove to the Wild Rose Depot. Upon entering, we immediately heard the sound of little chicks peeping, several cardboard boxes of them waiting to be picked up. Each box was about two feet square and divided into four compartments. Several small holes allowed air in the box. Each compartment had a straw bottom, and a half dozen or so little balls of yellow, loudly peeping, chicks.

“Hello, Herm,” said George Collum, the depot agent. “Those boxes over there are yours.”   We put the boxes of little chicks in the back seat of the Plymouth and headed home.  Once at home, we put them back of our wood-burning kitchen stove, to make sure they remained warm. They continued peeping.  Meanwhile, Pa started the stove in the brooder house, a little building some distance from the main chicken house.  The brooder house stove was about two feet tall, had a big hood around it, which provided a place for the little chicks to stay warm, eat, drink and grow.  Spring had come.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: The arrival of baby chicks was one more sign of the coming of spring.

WHERE TO BUY MY BOOKS:

To purchase Jerry’s books, Including, Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, go to your local bookstore, order online from bookshop.org, or purchase from the Friends of the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose—a fundraiser for them. Phone: 920-622-3835 for prices and ordering.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.
www.wildroselibrary.org
If you live in the western part of the state, stop at Ruth’s home town, Westby and visit Dregne’s.  and look at their great selection of my books, including my new ones, or order a book by calling them at 1-877-634-4414. They will be happy to help you.