Stories from Great Auntie Fern (chapter 1)

My name is Fern Alice *****. I was born in 1909. April the 3rd, 1909. And I was born on a wheat ranch that my father had homesteaded; about eight miles from the little town of *****, Washington. They moved out from Kansas by train in the 1800s. And while my father built a house on the land that he homesteaded, he put a big tent in ***** where the family stayed while he built a new house on the wheat ranch. Roy was born there.
The next year, Jennie was born there. So they lived in that tent at least two or three years 'til the house was built and they they moved out to the wheat ranch. Ethel, Grace, Blanche, and Floyd were born in Kansas and they moved out here by train. Paul and Roy and Jennie was born in ***** (in the tent there) and I was born on the wheat ranch.

I only lived on the wheat ranch a year until we moved to town because, by that time, the older ones were ready for high school.They had to move to town so the older ones could go to high school. So, I was a year old and Paul was two years old when we moved to town.

I was two years old, almost three when my mother had her last baby. It was a boy. And she (her mother) didn't make it.

She got Septicemia, which is blood poisoning and they didn't have antibiotics in those days so she couldn't be saved.

That's when I remember more because I was staying with the neighbors while she was sick. And the baby ‑‑ our friends Charlie ***** and his wife took the baby Lawrence, and was to keep him until the sisters and I could help take care of him. But he never returned because they got attached to him and they kept him all through his adult life and my father supported him.

But then my mother died in 1912, January 1912, and I was staying with the neighbors. And while I was there, I remember seeing the funeral procession going by.

Later in that day, I came down with Typhoid and pneumonia. My oldest sister carried me in a suitcase at least a half a mile up to the road at 11:00 at night to take me to the hospital. I was in the hospital three months.

The neighbors took turns taking me at night when I came home so I wouldn't suffocate. I've got a great big scar (pointed to her chest) where they took the puss out of my lungs. Nowadays they take it out of your back.

Here I am, 99 and still ticking.

Notes:

When Amanda comes to town she sits with Auntie Fern and records her memories.
Fern, who will be 100 on her next birthday, is the only surviving sibling of Amanda's Great Grandmother Jennie.

Fern was carried into the small town by her sister where they could catch the train which would transport them to the hospital, 16 miles away.

Jennie was born in 1902, so they may have lived in the tent longer than two or three years.

I chose to leave out last names and places to respect Auntie Fern's privacy. She does not have a clear understanding of blogs and the internet.