Fraser Picnics
Grandma Fraser had 11 children. A fact my mother felt burden with all her life. One of the few complaints she spoke about was that she had no childhood. As her mother just kept having more children, she was the mother caring for her younger siblings. Big families were a given then as it assured a way for many to have the man power to run a farm. But it was a drag on the oldest girls.
None of this impacted me as I grew up and I didn’t really find out about my mother’s feelings until I was an adult. All I knew was that I had lots of cousins, over 50. And the Fraser family was a close-knit group. Almost all settled within 50 miles of the original homestead. There was constant interaction between all of them during my childhood. One of the most memorable traditions was the annual reunion picnics each summer.
The reunion picnics were always at Uncle Gene’s farm just outside of Algona, Iowa. Eleanor, Gene’s wife, was one of my mother’s sisters. They had a typical family farm in Iowa raising seed corn, pigs with some dairy cows. Their house was set in the middle of a huge lawn, perhaps three acres, with the main barn on one side next to the pig lot, a wood lot on another side, and fields of corn on the other sides. Next to the house was a windmill that provided the running water; the best tasting water I have ever had. The lawn was clear except for a couple of huge pine trees and oak trees which were wonderful for climbing.
On a specified day in the summer, each family, usually 8 families, brought a main course and one or two side dishes and desert. About noon the food was spread out on long tables that seemed to stretch forever. Somehow there were never any two courses that were the same, chicken, ham, hot dogs, burgers, beef dishes, corn on the cob, beans, peas, salads of sorts, fruits, jello, cookies, pie, pie, and pies. Tables and blankets were spread over the lawn and everyone ate and ate. Following lunch it was time for games. Although there were a variety of games, baseball, badminton, horse shoes, the most notable was the croquet. This was not a typical gentleman’s game of croquet. First it was spread out over the gigantic lawn; it was more like golf with croquet mallet. Hits with the mallet were full strokes; almost like a golf swing. It was also game of poison. This meant that each time you completed going through the double hoops you were poison. If you hit someone else, you could send them as far away as possible. The favorite location to send someone, of course, was the hog lot. The best was if the ball actually made it in with the hogs and all the muck. This was done by placing your ball next to their ball, holding your foot on your ball, and striking your ball with the mallet as hard as possible.
At some point in the late afternoon all the adult men disappeared. The kids were left to run. The boys usually went into the wood lot and built forts out of fallen trees. Then we played cowboy and Indians protecting and attacking the forts. We might also go up in the hay loft of the barn and build forts in the hay or jump from the loft into big piles of hay. Here I learned never to jump and land on my back. Even though the hay looked soft, you could get the wind knocked out of by landing on your back.
After I had turned 19, I was invited to be with the men in the afternoon. It seems they went into the basement of the farmhouse to drink, cuss, and play cards. My uncles were notorious card players and gamblers. And I soon learned that whiskey and good card playing did not mix. They thought it great fun to get me tipsy and then take all my money. Strangely, my dad seemed to enjoy it as much as the old farmers did. My mother however seemed very cold on the trip home that day.