Presents...
The first homes of the early settlers were log cabins. Saw mills soon followed, with the next generation of homes being made of crude sawed lumber. The two homes on this page come from this time - around the turn of the century. They were tiny by today's standards, and were often un-insulated, unpainted, and very modestly furnished. Usually, the only source of heat was the kitchen stove which was kept going both winter and summer as it was also how they cooked. They put off a lot of heat which was sometimes good - and sometimes bad. Hopefully the following stories will give you a small hint of what it was like to live in those times - or fond memories for the rest of you.Jump within page to On the Plains of Southern Alberta
As told by: Isabel Walker (born 1919) and Walter Durtschi (born 1921)
© by Al Durtschi
Alfred Durtschi (my grandpa, the top photo on the home page) built his house, then in 1915, he rode his horse 90 miles to the nearest railroad station where he caught the train to Salt Lake City to find a wife. This was a large and modern house for the time and area, about 30 feet long and 15 feet wide. There was a bedroom and kitchen downstairs. Upstairs were two tiny bedrooms with slanted ceilings for when the children would be born. Ingeniously, it was insulated with saw-dust. Steep narrow stairs led to the upstairs. There was no railing on the second floor. It was a miracle no children ever fell through it in the dark.
After the children were born, Arnold and Walt had the bedroom at the top of the stairs. A wall in the center of the room separated their bedroom from a smaller room their sisters slept. In each room was a bed the children shared.
During the winters everyone huddled around the wood burning kitchen stove, the only source of heat. Before bedtime the kids got out their peach pits, and put them in the stove to heat. Sometimes Arnold heated a big rock. Then a few moments before bedtime the door to the upstairs was opened to let a bit of heat up to the bedrooms. After evening prayers the peach pits were put into bags and the children flew up the stairs, ripped off their clothes and jumped into bed with their warm bags. After the fire went out downstairs it was just as cold as if they had been outside. Inside the beds the children were kept warm by the thick wool quilts their mother had made. Outside the bed, frost formed on the tops of the blankets.
In the mornings the children scrambled to escape the cold. They jumped into their clothes and dashed down to the kitchen to a warm fire their father had built in the kitchen stove before he went out to do chores. After warming up, they each took their turns hurrying out to the two hole out house just west of the house. The kids remembered these mad dashes in the middle of the winter as absolutely horrible. Some of those mornings when the air was moist it seemed like they got froze to the seat.
Then the children took turns doing the chores before they went to school. The cows had to be milked, and water was fetched 120 yards from the creek running behind the house. And the chamber pot had to be emptied in the outhouse, then washed out in the creek. The chamber pot stayed under the girls bed upstairs. It was passed around a certain amount but it's normal resting place was in the girls room. On wash days the children helped their mother wash in her new washing machine powered by a gasoline engine.
Baths were taken in a small metal bath tub in the kitchen. After the big job of heating the water on the stove, the same water was used by everyone. The smallest children were bathed first, followed by the older children, then the parents. When the kid’s dad, Alfred, undressed, the girls turned their backs until he was in the tub. When everyone was finished, he took the tub outside and threw the soapy water on the snow or grass.
When the Westons first came to America, Otto stayed with the family three or four years and slept upstairs with the boys. Once when Otto was in bed a bat flew in the open window. As he flew around, Otto moved fast getting under the covers. Bats always flew around, with Arnold and Walt not paying any attention to them.
The Christmas tree was decorated with candles which were lit three or four times during the holidays. The family spent Christmas Eve at their Aunt Elizabeth's. After the two families had visited for a while, Alfred always said he had to go out and hold Santa Claus's reindeer. Soon, a knock came on the west window. With excitement, the children looked out the window as Santa's robust face shone in. The children were always afraid of Santa Claus. Santa masked his voice, and talked in a high pitch. Alfred’s children never figured out it was him. Santa brought the Christmas presents as well as candy, nuts, and sometimes an orange. Then they sang songs and ate home-made Ice cream.
As told by Glenn Adamson (born 1915)
© by Al Durtschi
Our house was a mile east of town. It was a small house about 18 feet by 30 feet with two rooms on the ground floor and two bed rooms for the kids upstairs. The upstairs room’s ceilings were slanted like the steep roof above them. Then perhaps four feet from the floor, the slanting ceilings changed into a vertical wall. These walls were set in about three feet from the main outside walls of the house. This was because the floor of the upper level was even with the outer gables.
There were no stairs in the house, and in order for us to get upstairs, we had to go out side, around to the end of the house and up a ladder that leaned up against the 2nd story door. The upstairs bedroom was lath and plastered with a window in the west end. Claude and Lewis, and now I also slept in the only bed in this little room. I generally had to sleep in the middle. For a mattress we had a straw tick. When the tick straw got pounded up too much we'd put new straw in so we had a fairly comfortable bed.
There was an old stove pipe hole in the floor between the upstairs bedroom and the kitchen. In the winter a very small amount of heat came up through this hole, but the room was mostly cold. One day I was downstairs and noticed the cat ready to pounce down through this hole. Before I could catch it, the cat jumped down onto the hot kitchen stove and burned it's feet. It moved quick getting off that stove. Through this hole we also heard our dad calling every morning, "Come on, get up and hear the birds singing." This was his way of waking us up in the morning. For light in this little upstairs bedroom we had kerosene lanterns. We didn't spend much time up in our little bedroom except to sleep. Once in a while we went up there in the summer time when it was warm to get away from everything. But not during the winters. It was too cold.
There was a small bedroom downstairs. The other room was the main living quarters. In this room was the kitchen and was also the dining and living area. We called it the kitchen. The walls were painted with a cream colored calcimine, a type of paint. On the partition wall separating the two rooms was a black cook range which burned coal or wood. We usually burned coal in it which we mined ourselves on the river bottom. Our stove had a water reservoir on one side of it. We had to fill this with a bucket, and get it out with a dipper. On the other side of the wall was the bedroom. It had a small round heater which connected into the same brick chimney as the cook stove. The chimney was built into the wall. Next to these two stoves was a doorway into the bedroom.
The kitchen was a fairly large for it's time. An outside door was on the south wall in the southeast corner. There was a small landing or step just outside the kitchen door about one step above the ground. Next to the door was a washstand for washing our hands and faces. Above it was a small cupboard where we kept our towels. When we finished washing, we opened up the door and threw out the dirty water. When we wanted water we poured it out of the bucket which was kept on the side of the wash stand. If we wanted hot water, we took it out of the stove reservoir. When we wanted more water we had to go outside to the cistern with the bucket and get it.
Next to the wash stand on the south wall was a hide-a-bed that went up against the wall when not in use. When the bed was put away it looked like a big cupboard. Dad slept in the hide-a-bed whenever he was home. My sisters more or less claimed the bedroom and that was where they slept. Some of us kids sometimes slept on the hide-a-bed with Dad, but us boys usually slept upstairs. In the center of the room was a table about five feet square.
When I first saw this table, I noticed a deep crease in the top. When I asked what it was, my family pointed to a hole in the window frame of the double wide window in the west wall. It seems some years before Ray was standing back from the table with a 22 rifle. Fooling around with it, he didn't realize it was loaded. The gun went off, and the bullet glanced off the top of the table. After it had dug the little ditch in the top of the table, it imbedded itself in the window frame. Jenny happened to be sitting in a chair leaning back against the wall next to this window. Her head was just 4 or 5 inches from where this bullet imbedded itself.
Between the double window and the table was a home made three seat bench. There were other chairs here and there around the table. At night the table was moved back to make room for the lowering of the hide-a-bed. Sometimes when more people were at home, we'd even set up some bed springs on blocks. This was placed against the north wall of the kitchen next to the table. When not in use, the bed springs were stored outside in the coal shed. On the north wall toward the east end of the room was another window. Beyond the window was a narrow cupboard. This was next to the door to the bedroom. In this cupboard we kept the china plates and other utensils we used every day. Our dirty dishes were washed on the table in a wash pan, then dried with a hand towel and put back in the cupboard. The room was full, yet it wasn't so cluttered we couldn't get around.
Home Page: http://waltonfeed.com/
All contents copyright (C) 1996, Al Durtschi. All rights reserved.
This information may be used by you freely for non-commercial use with my name and E-mail address attached.
Revised: 2 May 96