The John Deere was a tricycle type tractor that we used for the vegetable garden and the vineyard. It was a 2-cycle monstrosity that blew exhaust out the side of the engine and right on one's left foot. It had power nothing, not even the engine! I had to stand on the foot rest to pull the steering wheel to make a turn and, if there had ever been any brakes, I never found them.
It was a three day job to plow the vineyard, between the tight turns and the narrow rows, I was probably the strongest 11 year old boy in school. As bad as that tractor was, when I graduated to the orchard tractor, I remembered that John Deere fondly!
The orchard tractor was a Holt-Alyce, invented by the Holt Brothers of Stockton, California and was the forerunner of the Caterpillar Tractor. It had been purchased by my grandfather and was still a good tractor, if a bit hard to start. It had an "arm breaker" crank; I wasn't big enough at first, so Dad would have to start it for me.
I learned some VERY interesting new words during that period and I also learned NOT to repeat them in the hearing of my mother!
Unlike newer models, it had no springs, not even in the seat! A part of our orchard was a hundred years old and had originally been plowed with a mule and plow. At each row of trees, there was a ridge and slamming down those ridges at each and every row of trees did strange things to ones posterior!
I conned Rack into plowing for me ONCE, he threatened to do bad things to my body if I EVER asked him again!
The raising and harvesting of prunes is an interesting science called HARD LABOR. Contrary to a certain President's Executive Order, prunes are not dried plums. Prunes had always enjoyed a special niche in farm commodities, they were not under the Department of Agriculture's Marketing Plan.
They lost that protection by Executive Order, along with the description of being a separate fruit from plums. Plums do not have sufficient sugar or fiber to dry to anything more that a skin and pit. They are related, as a rose is to an apple, but they are not the same.
In those days, everyone dried their prunes in the sun, so they had to be "dead ripe" or they would not dry properly. They were gently shaken from the trees, onto the ground and were then picked up by people on their knees.
The orchards were hard rolled until smooth, it was like kneeling on a concrete pad!
As many as three or four separate times were needed before all the fruit was harvested. Each seventy pound field lug of fresh fruit was tipped into a basket and lowered into boiling lye water. This killed any fungus that might grow on the sugar laden fruit and put microscopic cracks or checks in the skin to allow the moisture to escape during the drying process.
In the Napa Valley, there were two major varieties of prunes grown, the sugar prune, which was mostly for table use, and the French prune. The French prune was smaller, but had a high fructose content and was used by candy manufacturers and also made into a soft drink, called Dr. Pepper.
Being a "Farm Boy" I got to do it all, shake, pick, process, and dry.
The O'Donnell dry yard was across the county road from our own and Rack and I could shout our commiserations to each other as we rolled the fruit on the drying trays at 4:00 AM. Boy, did I ever advance my vocabulary the morning our shouting woke Rack's Mother up at 4:00 AM!
As we got older, Rack and I took on more responsibility to the running of the farms.
High School started for us in the 7th Grade and ran through the 10th. Grades 11 and 12 were Senior High School and were not a requirement at that time. If you had reached the age of 16, you could graduate from high school at the end of the 10th grade.
Both Rack and I were 12 when we entered high school, things were different then, it was a county wide High School and 147 of us graduated from the 10th grade and 68 of us graduated from the 12th grade. The valley was a farming community, if the fruit was late, school did not start, if it looked like rain and it was drying time, school let out.
Those were good years to be growing up in the Napa Valley, there were a gaggle of us boys, probably ten or twelve of us that palled around. We didn't get into serious trouble, but we did get a "certain reputation"! Things that would draw jail time today were thought of as childhood pranks. Nobody got hurt and no property was seriously damaged. Sure, a few apples went missing, some strawberries mysteriously disappeared and a few outhouses got tipped over on Halloween.
It was a safe time, children were not abducted, drugs simply didn't exist, dope was what we glued our model airplanes together with and a hood was what went over the engine on your jalopie!
On the other side of the coin, everyone helped everyone else. When our barn caught on fire, my sister just started cranking the wall phone until Millie, the crippled lady who served as 24 hour operator on our farmer's telephone line, answered and she started calling for folks to come and help us.
New babies were a cause for neighborhood celebration, and for a death, the whole neighborhood went into mourning.
If old Mrs. Jaydell down the road was feeling poorly, Grandma Tillie was taking her some homemade soup.
When I got in trouble in school, it got home before I did!
By the same token, if I made the Honor Roll, that also got home before I did too.
We boys, all of us that ran around together, were closer than brothers, it didn't matter if some were a little bit younger, or some were a little bit older, we were BROTHERS.
Pick on one of us and you were taking on the whole crowd! When one of us was in trouble, the rest lent a hand getting you out of trouble.
It was a time when friendship meant something tangible and lasted lifetimes. There are still a few of that group alive, I know that if I was in trouble today and needed help, all it would take would be a telephone call.
My most special friend was Richard (Rack) O'Donell. He has passed away now, but he left me the job of finding his grandson, Richie. Rack's son, Roger, died before Rack, the victim of a sniper attack in Afghanistan.
The boy was lost in childcare after his mother and Rack's son, Roger, split up.
Rack knew I would do as he asked, it took me three years, but I found my godson, Richard Roger O'Donell. He is as fine a boy as his father and his grandfather. He lives with a guardian family now and is happy at 17 years old. He plans to follow his father's and grandfather's footsteps, he is a Cadet First Lieutenant in his high school Marine JR-ROTC.
I administer his inheritance and will see to it that he has the education and the opportunities to be as fine a man as his dad and grandad.
TBC
Follow the Farm Boys of the Napa Valley as they grow up in the world that existed in the 1940s and 50s. Find out what it was like to live without the electronic toys of today, no computers, television was in its infancy and cell phones were not even a dream. Going to the moon belonged to Buck Rogers and a stamp for a letter cost 3 cents!