Tape 6: Building the log cabin

0:05 Caught singing on the road, and the dream of a cabin of her own

to sing as nice as I knew how. And I was pretty pleased about it. Well, it sang gorgeous and the trees around and everything. And so I must have sang a couple of verses. And all of a sudden I started.

There was, it was my misfortune to meet someone. Our neighbor boy, he was about 19. We had a couple of friends with him. and here they come around well the road was so then such a big bend around you know that you couldn't see but a rod or two headed you see so here they come around the bend when I come towards him and I was so embarrassed well I was there when he was born but by gully that don't cut the figure when he's already 19 and he was smiling from year to year looking at me and the friends too they had a little

giggle and there I was caught, you know, unexpectedly, and that, well, you know, that's the first time I never told him hello, and he says, hi, Agnes, and he kept on going, I kept on going the opposite way, we match like.

And just then I was, that's when my thought of a cabin of my own, a little cabin I figured I'll have built out of logs, up on the hill someplace where I can look at the creek down the, and I could watch the deer where they go by the dear path.

And I said to myself, and there I can just sit on a little bench, and if I feel like singing anything, English or Bohemian or hymn or any kind of a song, absolutely I will not be embarrassed because I'll be sitting on my land, you know, and do what I want to do.

It's still a free country. And that's all these things I was thinking I didn't sing no more. I went another quarter of a mile on this year trick, and turned around and went back. And that's where the cabin of my dreams started, the thought of it.

2:17 Bulldozing a hillside for $5 and cutting the first logs

And actually, about 15, 20 years, oh, at least 20 years later, finally my cabin was built. And it was built bigger and nicer by my husband. It took him a whole year to build, to cut the trees. I helped him peel the skin off from them trees, and we let him dry.

And he never built a log one, and now he was making the notches in the corner, and I didn't want to have nobody had expense with it. So I've been saving and saving, and so finally, I was hinting to my son to go and straighten out the little hillside where I want the cabin on, see, and he claimed he was too busy and everything, so he never got around to doing it.

So I was to my next door neighbors, and we was talking, and he asks, and the neighbor says, Dick, he says, what, uh, oh, what was you doing like this forenoon? Oh, I says, I was on the place where I'd like to have my cabin built, but, uh, there's no takers to straighten it out.

on the hillside. Well, he told me, he says, oh, I got a little caterpillar, I'll come there some evening, and I'll straighten it out for you.

So then, in two days, here comes my neighbor, and he says, come on, Agnes, says, well, bulldoze your spot for your cabin. So we went, and he went and pushed the trees and stumps the side and stones and whatever it was and of course if I would have known what I know now I would have him do a little more of it but he was there two hours and my husband before that oh maybe six seven months before Dick was doing this bulldozing he had another big bulldozer come and bulldoze a piece of field and he charged him $11 an hour.

So I had $26 saved up, so I was careful not to overdo two hours, you know. So I watched it when it was two hours of bulldozing, I told him, I said, you might as well stop. It's getting dark, and I says, it's flat enough and everything.

That'll work fine, and I was going to pay him, and he wouldn't take no money. I said, you can't put water in the gas tank and think that it's all right. I said, you've got to buy the gas.

So you have to take at least $10. So you can buy gas for your tractor, bulldozer. I says, even if you take your time free for me, which is a very nice thing to do. Well, Lee says, you know how when I was little you used to go tickle me to make me laugh?

Well, there you are. So I'm tickling you. I don't want to take no $10. So finally he took five towards the gas. So that left me enough money to go and buy several boxes of 50 pounds in each or how much it was.

It was quite heavy. Two, three of them I bought of great big nails for my husband to, when he gets the logs together and this, and that, you know. So I had the boxes of nails home. It was very happy.

So then I had quite a few logs already tealed and caught. Oh, yeah, I got to tell you about friends of mine from town. They work at the mill with the veneer, and they come one evening with a chainsaw.

Their dinner buckets from where they were in the factory, never went home even after the factory was released. They come straight to my house, and they ask, where's the trees you're going to cut, Agnes. Mr. Charles Evich, and I forgot, Leo Schlesinski, I think his name was, them too come.

So I had the trees already blazed, you know, chopped off a little the bark, so it could show that it's white, that them are the trees I wanted to cut. So they cut 18 of them, and by that time it got dark.

Well, I said, that's a plenty for now. I said, after I till these, then I'll have somebody else or something, cut some more. if necessary.

6:59 Agnes's $5 hatchet, her husband joins the work, and a horse for tomato gravy

So they left, and they wouldn't take no money or not. They says, all right, Agnes, when you get your cabin built, we'll come and look it over. So they went home. So next day, I had my little new hatchet.

I paid $5 for a beautiful little hatchet. I took it, and I was going to go in the woods and start peeling the logs. And my husband said, where the heck you think of gold with an axe? Where did you get that axe?

I said, well, I bought it. I said, Charlie and Aliyo went and they cut the logs last night. So the trees. So I'm going to go there this morning, and I'll do all I can. And when I get too tired, I'll go home.

And finally, I'll have them all peeled. Well, how many did you just cut? Well, it's 18 or 20. I don't know exactly. So he said, well, I'll have to go and sharpen my axe. And I've got to go with you to find out so you don't build on somebody else's land.

Well, I thought that was kind of cute. So he wasn't going to have nothing to do with that work with a cabin or nothing. So he went and he shopped his axe and some kind of a draw knife.

And we went to work and walked up there, just for a little ways. And he says, well, the trees. So I showed him. So I brought him a bottle of beer with me and he smoked a pipe on the stump.

And he says, well, let's go get after it. Well, I was surprised that he was willing to work, too, you know. He worked with me, and we'd done four logs, four trees, skin them, by noon. Then we went home, and after, we didn't go to storm.

And we kept on doing it for several days, and first thing, you know, we had all of them peeled. So he says, oh, there ain't going to be enough. Well, I said, I don't know. I don't want too big of a building.

Just someplace where I can have. a little window and a door and a little rock are sitting between the door jams and watch the scenery from it well i figured to say eight by six feet or something like that little cubby thing instead of that well he says i'll measure this and say why it's no use of making a little dinky thing like that and first thing you know he was interested enough that he started measuring and he was putting ditches around where the main log's going to be, and he went and he hauled some sand so deep, six or eight inches deep into these

trenches, and then he got himself some big, big cement bricks, and he put them in there and level them off and all that, and he kept on it day by day, and first thing, you know, he had all set ready for the first logs.

Well, they were in the woods, you know, and so he says, how are going to get these logs? Well, you know, the trees were places too close together and all that. He couldn't go there with his little tractor.

And so finally I got a bright idea who's got a horse, and Louis Gillick had a horse, in fact, two horses. And so I seen him Sunday, like at church, and I asked him, I said, do you suppose I could borrow your horse for a day?

With the harness on it, I can go and drag them locks for my husband to the little hill where I'm going to have the cabin. He said, I tell you what, you go and make me a tomato gravy like my mother used to make and some dumplings, and I will haul all them logs myself with a horse.

I says, well, that's easy. So I made him a good dinner, and he hauled the hallogs. There was 18 or 20. Well, anyhow, he put him right on the spot where the neighbor bulldozed and where my job had everything ready.

10:55 Building the log cabin: logs, a sawmill, a roof, and a fireplace

And so we started. My man said, oh, not that little of a shandy. He said, we'll make it 18 by 20 or a little bigger if we can. And so he kept on measuring and stuff, and he cut the tops off and that.

And so we were ready. So he started with the first logs. And he pulled and pushed and everything until he got it. And he got the first two, and then the two criss -cross. He never built nothing like that.

I mean, he built nice places, things, but never out of logs. So then cornered things, he chipped out with his axe and everything. And it went pretty nice. He looked real nice. So he put about four high all around, four around the whole thing.

and we had to stop because my logs run out of logs and so he says okay he says we'll go cut some trees and we'll have to peel them and dragon so he did and he done a beautiful job and then he when it was raining he made a frame for the east and the west side and then a frame for the south side and quite a large frame for the north side and a frame where he's going to put the door and he had that all done in the barn while it was raining.

So then when we had the other logs ready, he hauled this up there and we had it all fitted up nice on top of these four high, you know. It was just right to look out of the window when you stand.

And so then he proceeded to drag the others with the tractor up the hill and he put the others on by that time was winter. So we had to stop. Well, he said, let's go look around some lumber yards and see where I can get so many, so many two -by -fours and so many two -by -sixes and so many boards for the top of the roof and so many for the floor.

Well, we went to two, three places, lumber yards in the vicinity around. We had to hogging one spot, Birchwood and Rice Lake. And they wanted so much for the lumber and the two -by -four. it would have cost me a fortune.

So I says, no, we ain't going to do that. I said, that costs too much. John says, yes, it would. So he said, you know what? He says, I'll go and cut 20 or 30 logs or 40. I don't know how many he cut.

Around 40, I think. And of our own trees, nice, big ones. And he went to work and had some friends of his cut it into 2x4s, 2x4s, and pretty boards. And they did it, that fall yet cut it, very close friends of ours, the Fouca brothers and their sister.

So, exactly on, so a day before the Halloween, here Helen Fouca, the sister of these brothers that had this sawmill, a phoan us that the lumberies all cut on big piles. So John, my husband, decide, well, let's go and pile it up real nice and put the criss -cross pieces between each layer of boards and two -by -fourths so that they will dry by spring, you know, kind of freeze out of whatever he called it.

So we've done that, and it took us till evening to, you know, make a pile of two -by -fours and two -by -sixths and then a pile of boards. And it took quite a time for John to do all this.

And so it was evening when we come, and it was kind of drizzly weather. But anyhow, we had that done. So then winter went by, and I went to see the sight of the cabin and with them four longs all around, you know, four on one side, four on the other and all that.

And he had the windows and the things all set and ready to put in in the spring. And so it comes about the first week in April, and it was a nice, sunshiny day, and John says, well, we'll just take our son's life.

little truck, pickup truck, and we will haul some of the lumber, and a little by little we'll haul it all up there. So we did. Now, we hauled it all up there, and John started to make floors, two -by -six floors, and then put other boards on top, and then he put the two -by, oh, then he finished the rest of the logs, because by that time they were dry enough, and we made it just so high as it was supposed to be, and then he came.

carried the windows in and the door and all that. And then he proceed to start to put the two -by -fours for the roof. He made the roof part of it. Then he put the boards on himself and made a trip to town and got the asphalt roofing, put it all on himself.

And so it was under roof, you know, so it wouldn't rain in there. So I was quite happy over the whole thing. So then he left a spot for my fireplace And he never was around Fireplaces too much And he didn't know how to go about it very much How to start or what to do Oh, but then finally he went to see a couple Two, three fireplaces And none of them was what I wanted or what he wanted So finally we settled on the way we wanted it And he made it real nice out of stones And cement and all that Then he bought

special kind of bricks to put in fire bricks, I guess he called him, to line the fireplace, so they would hold heat or whatever it was the cause of it. And then he made on top, he made out of wood stove tops, where the old -time ladies cooked on top of that stove.

Well, my neighbor gave me two of these irons, and he bought some irons to attach. hatch it real nice, and I can cook on top of my fireplace real nice. And he fixed it just beautiful. And then he went to Rice Lake and got a pipe, just the right kind and everything, and put it all together.

And so about three weeks later, we had it all complete.

17:33 A fire that roared, a Father's Day steak dinner, and 180 people at the open house

And the cement had to finish off something. He says, dry up or whatever. how after three weeks we went and made a fire in the fireplace. And he had such a good, he made it so good that we had the door open and like I say, we made this fire, and rooved up with the flames and the noise, up the chimney.

It had such a draw. So we ran outside to see if we could shut it off a little, the fireplace part of it, the front part. So he found a piece of iron, and he quickly put it there, and it stopped the roar in the chimney.

So it's already six years since we've got the fireplace and the cabin, and we still got that iron there. So when we do make a fire in there, it will not roar or two, but you'll burn nice. It heats up the cabin in about five minutes, nice, so it's very pleasant, but we didn't have too many fires in.

there. The top of all, show my appreciation to my husband for doing it all. Nobody helped him to do nothing on it. He'd on all the nailing and all the fixings and measurings and everything. So the first Father's Day come around the 15th of June, and I figured out at the head, and I made fresh rye bread on Saturday, Sunday was the Father's Day.

And just the way he likes it, and I brought some steak there and onions and a big iron kettle that I know would heat up to nice and warm. I had the papers and the wood and everything ready in the fireplace and table set and all that.

So when we come from church instead of staying home, I told him, I says, I would like him to take that box when I had the steak in and the bread and all that to carry up. I says, put that in a car and we'll go over there.

and I bought him a mystery paperback because he likes that sort of the elderly queen. I remember that well. And I told him, now you sit on this here couch and relax while I fix up the dinner. So in about 20 minutes, I had the stakes done.

I slit the fire first in that. Before I knew it, we had the steaks done, and his ripe, the way he liked it. I steamed it above the meat, and we had a lot. dinner. And I said, well, this is the Father's Day dinner instead of going out, you know, in a restaurant like we usually did.

We had it up there and we really enjoyed it. So I had it once or twice since I had Father's Day dinner there for him. That's the best I could do for. And then now I listen to him what he tells me to do.

I do and all that to just to show him that I really appreciate it. So for years, five, six years, I went to the cabin any time I felt like it. Of course, my health don't let me go there too often now.

The first two, three years, I went there quite often, maybe two, three times a day, two, three times a week. But lately, I'm glad I get there in summertime once a week on Sunday afternoon. And that, so I kind of like it.

Oh, yes, and when I was 65 years old, my grandchildren and, of course, my daughter -in -law's met, they made a kind of an opening party or whatever you would call it. They invited the neighbors and all that to come, and we had lots of good food to eat and drink.

And folks come, and they stayed a little while, and then they left, did somebody else come? Open house, I guess they called it. Well, anyhow, I had 180 people come that afternoon. and it was very gratifying that they all liked the cabin, my husband made for me.

So that's about all I can tell about the cabin, except I love it. I've got lots of antiques in there and lots of little trinkets that folks brings me and children give me, you know, on the shelves. He made me beautiful shells in there, mahogany colored, and he made different kind of shelves, and he made a kind of like a cupboard, real nice.

And then he, oh, and I moved my mother's old -fashioned round table in there, and I fixed it up real nice, too. And then he made me two beautiful benches. Everybody admires them. He really made it nice. He says, well, we can get a lot of ladies over here, so they got someplace to sit, so we used them quite a bit and all that.

And it is still nice and I just love it yet always I always remember my cabin and I take a lot of people there they ask to see it so that's about all for this time

22:34 The deer who came to smell the flowers

well now I'll tell you folks about the little misfortune that I didn't have a chance to see what my neighbor did she it was WC and Marie and they have built a beautiful little cabin and an addition for a bedroom on the side just out of board and she bought some apple trees and plum trees and stuff and they made a real nice garden and she enjoyed it very much and so did he and they sold their home place where they used to live for years to their young one of their young sons well anyhow she was situated there and she asked me to come

over to visit and I did and she says you know I She says, you've got such a beautiful flowers all over around your house and all, and it would really be beautiful if I had it here in the woods.

Well, I said, that ain't going to be so bad for you to have. I said, you just come with W .C., your husband, and bring two or three boxes, and empty boxes, grocery boxes. And I said, we'll dig you up, whatever you like.

come over with him and then you can go and plant a plant whatever you like so she did and he made kind of a bank alongside of their driveway and he braced it with posts and planks and everything and made it real nice you know within three four steps away she had beautiful pines and then her cabin you know So she really made it nice So I gave her all kinds of plants And everything The first year She watered it They carried water from the creek So all the plants caught Well she had a pretty nice There wasn't too many blossoms But it all caught

nice and started growing Well So then Well we were kind of nice So together we got together See one another and stuff But she said You know she says I got these apple trees and they're doing nice and all that.

And I planted some raspberries, she said, and strawberries and the other garden. And it looks like okay, she says, I think we're going to just love it here. But we didn't see another too often, mostly at church, you know.

We went to the same church on Sunday to say hello and a few words and stuff. And so the time went on, and she said, oh, she said, said one day at the church, she says, Agnes, can you possibly come and see me?

I got something to tell you. I said, sure, sure. So she was really the closest neighbor to me and about my age and so far. So I went up there, and she says, you have no idea what we've seen.

She says, look at them flowers. Aren't they beautiful? That was until two years or so after I gave her the flowers. I says, you sure got it nice. clear than me yet. I said, I'm very happy for you as you can enjoy the flowers.

Well, she says, it ain't only me that enjoys the flowers or Jim, my man. It's the deer. I says, don't tell me. Yes, she said, the other night, the other night she says, I woke up, oh no, she says, I was listening to the TV there till after 12, some kind of a special she always watched.

And Jim, her husband, was sleeping already. And it was a beautiful moonlight night, just like daytime, practically. And she happened to glance out of her window. They had two big windows in the front kind of towards the flower garden.

And she says, I've seen five or six deer smelling to my flowers. So she says, I got all excited. I went and I woke up my husband and showed him with my finger to his lips to shut up, not to say nothing.

And I motioned to him to come to the window. So he did. And there, him and I, we watched for a good half an hour of how the deer loved the flowers. Because, as she says, each one went different to smell different one and they went by one another and smelled this and smell that.

And they were walking the whole length of that bank that he fixed up with these planks and posts where he planted all these nice flowers. Oh, I She had a beautiful riot of different colors and smells and everything.

And she says, we spent more than half an hour just watching them. And something, oh, Jim, she says, I think made a motion or move or something in the glass, in the window. And one of the deer must have seen it.

And she says, great big whistle. And the way they went all, three of them had velvet horns, a great big jelly. horns, you know, with a fuzz on them. She's seen them just as plain as if it was daytime.

And she says, this one of them with these horns made this whistle. And she says, like if somebody shot into the whole five, they all went different directions and disappeared. Well, she says, that was some experience that I never dreamed ever seeing or, you know.

And I says, well, I sure would have laughed twice. I said, that was my misfortune that I wasn't here. She says, what the heck would you be doing around midnight down my place? Well, I said, they should come and smell mine.

I got nice ones too, you know. But our house was a little further away from the woods. Hers was right in the woods. You might as well say a beautiful spot, you know, up on a hillside and stuff.

And she lived there for several years with him. And that's the man that was picking than blackberries. Maybe that'll be another story I'll tell you about. when I was trying to talk to him thinking it was her husband there and instead of that was something else.

28:56 The little cabin in the woods that came down

So she lived there a good many years until one year. We had a terrible cloudburst and he, she being his little house on the hillside and on this here bank, he wanted to save some of the strawberry plants and stuff.

So he went out with a shovel and a hole to make a kind of a little dam so the water that was so rain and so terrible regular cloudburst so to stop the water to take away the good earth from his garden into the creek and while doing that he got a stroke he got too excited to to a perplexed about the whole thing see this was about the fourth year that they were there in the woods so then he stayed there with Mrs.

Yet, and she tried to teach him how to use his hand and all that. But just the same, he, after a year or so in the woods, handicapped like he was, they bought a little house in town close to one of their daughters, and there they stayed for another couple of years.

And then he was getting kind of worse, so they took him to Milwaukee, the original place where they come from and there he died. So Mrs. Let one of the sons have the cabin and then the son needed the lumber or something so they took the cabin apart.

And of course the three, four beautiful apple trees that they had when there was nobody living there, that deer come and they slash the branches off trying to get at the apples so the apple trees are ruined. And the two plum trees are still growing but I don't, not being taken care of it.

and stuff and minored the hindoon very good. I was there a couple years ago. Oh, and I should tell you, when I, they had a chicken coop for their little chickens. In daytime, they let them loose in the woods.

And for the night, they shot them, see. And they had a woven wire around, everything. Then they had a kind of like a corn crib, but it was solid boards instead of having the little spaces like for crabs of corn, you know, they did.