June, a Special Month

 

Strawberry pie photo by Steve Apps

June. A very special month. Let’s start with it being Dairy Month in Wisconsin.  A chance to applaud the hardworking farmers and cheesemakers that keep Wisconsin the number one cheesemaking state in the nation.  Wisconsin has been number one since 1910 when our cheesemakers took the title away from New York State, which had been the nation’s top dairy state. So many great cheese varieties to try—some 600 of them.  Which is most popular these days?  Cheddar?  Nope, it’s Mozzarella. This country likes its pizza and Mozzarella is a prime ingredient.

June has the longest day of the year, the most daylight hours of any of the months.  And it also marks the beginning of summer—officially.

June is the month of fresh peas, lettuce and radishes from the garden.  Nothing tastes better than vegetables that have been freshly harvested..

For this old farm boy, June was also haymaking month.  I will never forget the smell of freshly cut and curing alfalfa—no perfume comes close.

But of all the memories, one sneaks up on top.  Strawberries.  We had a sizeable patch of them—they were my mother’s project.  We picked them and sold them to friends, relatives, and traded for groceries with them at the Mercantile store in Wild Rose.  And we ate them three times a day.  On our cornflakes at breakfast, on shortcake for lunch, and if we were lucky, in a strawberry pie for supper.  My mother also canned strawberries—no freezing as we didn’t have electricity. We enjoyed them all winter long.  When unexpected company came, she brought up from a cellar a jar of canned strawberries.  Always a treat for our city relatives.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: June, a special month in many ways.

 

WHERE TO BUY MY BOOKS:

To purchase my books, 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.

 

 

A Petunia Story

 

Photo by Jerry Apps

Petunias.  Everyone grows them.  They are as common as dandelions.  We take them for granted.  And as the saying goes, “If you can’t grow petunias, you probably should be doing something else.”

             I did a little checking and discovered that petunias are native to South America and there are umpteen different varieties of them.  Petunias were introduced to Europe in the early 1800s—two species, one white-flowered and the other purple-flowered. They eventually made their way to the United States, where plant breeders had a hay day developing many colors of the soon to become one of the most popular flowers grown in the country.

            It was in 1958 that I first began growing petunias.  I was working as a county extension agent for Green Lake County.  I lived in a little travel trailer, eight feet wide and 24 feet long.  And I missed gardening.  I shared this information with the owner of the trailer court.  She said, “Why don’t you dig up a little patch of ground by your trailer door, and I’ll give you a flower to plant.  It was my smallest garden ever—about one-foot square. 

            The following day she brought me a little lavender petunia—one plant.  That was my garden that summer.   I watered it regularly and made sure no weeds grew near it.  It grew and grew and soon had several beautiful lavender flowers, which greeted me each morning when I left for work and again when I returned in late afternoon.

            One day in August, my landlord asked if she could pick one of my little petunia flowers.  “Sure,” I said.  What I didn’t know is that she was active in the Green Lake Flower Club and entered my little petunia in the annual flower contest.  My little lavender petunia won first place. I framed the winner, which I have to this day.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Even flowers have stories to tell.

 

WHERE TO BUY MY BOOKS:

To purchase my books, 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.

 

 

What's in a name? Photo by Jerry Apps

 

It’s only a wildflower.  A little rose, a wild rose.    It grows on my farm, as it does in many other places in the area. But it has meaning and memories more than any other wildflower for me.  You see, I was born on a farm in the township of Rose in Waushara County, four and a half miles from the village of Wild Rose.

            In 1973, I wrote a little book titled Village of Roses, the history of Wild Rose.  While writing the book I went searching for the source of the village’s name. The obvious answer, it was named after the wild roses growing in the area.  Nope, that’s not correct. Another possibility, an old-timer shared, with a grin on his face. “The village is named after this young lady, Rose. She was a bit on the wild side.”  Interesting idea, but also not correct.

With a little digging I learned that many folks who settled in around Wild Rose came from upstate New York, from a village named Rose, in Wayne County. It just happened that the year I wrote the book, I also was doing some work at Syracuse University.  I looked at a map and discovered Rose, was only about an hour’s drive from Syracuse, so I drove up there.  I stopped at the Post Office and introduced myself to the elderly clerk as being from Wild Rose, Wisconsin.  She greeted me like a long-lost son had returned.  I soon discovered that several of the names receiving mail from the post office were the same names as people living in the Wild Rose area.  The man who homesteaded my farm, in 1867, Tom Stewart, was from Rose, New York.

A surprising finding,   Rose, New York was named after Robert Rose, an early landowner in the town, not after a flower.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: The history of placenames often reveals surprising information.

WHERE TO BUY MY BOOKS:

To purchase my books, 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

The Village of Roses book is available from the Wild Rose Historical Society.
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.

 

 

Wild Rose Restoring Old Mill

 

Wild Rose Mill.  Photo by Jerry Apps

Every old building has a story to tell.  The old mill at Wild Rose is one of them.  Francis Strong built

 the mill in 1873 and it served farmers in the Wild Rose area for many years.  In 1904 Ed Hoaglin re-

developed the mill, including expanding the size of the millpond and adding a steel flume and

 penstock. The mill was always water-powered.

            In 1908, a water-powered generator was added and the village of Wild Rose had electricity, decades before those living on the nearby farms had electric power.  For years, the mill was a social center for farmers who waited for their grist to be ground. As a kid, I often rode with my father to the mill, joining the farmers who sat in the little mill office, which was heated by a wood stove.  It was here where I learned how the crops, the corn and the oats and the alfalfa in the community were doing.  It was here where I heard stories—so many stories.  Stories of winters past, which were always more fierce than the current one. “You throw a pail of water out of the house and it freezes before it hits the ground.”  Summers so hot “You could fry an egg on a flat stone.”

            Today the old mill has closed, but the memories remain.  The village of Wild Rose now owns the building and they are raising money to restore it.  If you are interested in donating to “The Wild Rose Milling Company Restoration Project,” send your check to:

            Village Clerk, Village of Wild Rose, PO Box 292

            Wild Rose, Wisconsin 54984

            I’ve sent in my check.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: When you tear down an old building, you lose a piece of history.

 

WHERE TO BUY MY BOOKS:

To purchase my books, 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.