Edgar Webster REASOR (1885-1953) and Lillie Belle LYTLE (1887-1985)

Lillie and Edgar REASOR in the farm house kitchen washing dished.

Kitchen
Goldia Reasor Goldman Miller:
When we moved there [100 acre hillside farm near English, IN], someone had started a cellar under the kitchen. They had dug out some dirt and gathered in a few rocks, then I guess the job got too big for them. Dad hitched the team to a low sled and went around over the farm and gathered up long, sort of square rocks and brought them to the house. Rocks were plentiful on our farm. After the dirt was dug our and moved away, Dad proceeded to wall up the sides with these rocks that he had shaped with the chisel and sledge hammer so they would fit together. They were laid in concrete and when finished, a concrete floor was poured making a good solid room. Shelves were made across one end to old the many jars of fruit that were canned every year. Later the cream separator was put down there, where the cream was separated from the milk. We had to do this before and after school each day. Later, when electricity came to the country, Dad put an electric pump in the cellar and running water in the kitchen.

If we had a bushel or two of peaches or some other fruit or vegetables that needed to be worked up, Dad would take time out from the other work to help us children peel while Mom canned.

Goldia Reasor Goldman Miller:
Dad was a very high-strung, strong willed, person. He was the head of his household, and we all knew it. When he told we children to do something we knew we better do it. He was always very affectionate with Mom. She often sat on his lap and was shown attention. When they had to go to the store in the wagon, he always helped her in and out of the wagon. Later when we girls weren’t around to do the dishes, he would sit in a chair and dry the dishes while Mom washed. They always did things together. He liked to have her out where he was working around the shop or such to find things for him or hand them to him as he worked.

Garland Lee Reasor:
Meals were a total activity. The balance of the family would wait for an hour for someone to come from the fields or woods or berry patch. We didn’t need a dinner bell because Mom usually could reach the absentee by calling. Her voice reached most any area a member might be. I suppose we waited to give everyone an equal chance for at our house left-overs were definitely never a problem.

At times when there were too many visitors to set around the table, the procedure was different. The men, the visiting women and enough of the older children to fill the seats ate at ‘first table’. When they finished, the table was cleared and reset. The family women and the rest of the children would then eat what was left. The same priority was used in sleeping. When company spent the night, the younger children slept on the floor. Dad and Mom were great hosts, and we had relatives each summer to spend several days.

Garland Lee Reasor:
He was not very demonstrative, but he used to slap Mom on the rear while she was clearing the table and sometimes full her down on his lap and kiss her neck. At the community church the older men sat on the right side of the chapel and the women on the left facing each other. There was no opportunity to hold hands in church.

Garland Lee Reasor:
We had made to order family nights. It takes a lot of talking and laughing and singing to get a bushel of corn shelled. This would be an evening chore for the family. The shelling corn was removed by hand from the cob and usually caused blisters. It then was taken by horseback to the mill to be ground into meal for making cornbread. In the summer the whole family participated in peeling fruit and shelling or breaking beans for canning. Hog killing was an all day affair and sometimes even included the neighbors. The fire was started before daylight in order to bet the water hot no three so four hogs could be butchered before dark If things went smoothly we could count on fresh liver for the noon meal. Of course we ate ears, tail, feet and everything.

Gordon Lloyd Reasor:
In the winter evening we would sit in the kitchen by the hot cook stove and shell a ‘turn’ of corn. I always had a blister on my hand before we were through. But I enjoyed the storied he told while we worked. About Ole Shep, the dog he had when we were babies. How Old Shep wouldn’t let anyone come near us when we were out. Sometimes he wouldn’t even let Mom near us. And how Ole Shep would lay and guard his coat all day… or protect the wagon. During the deep snow of the winter of 1917-18, we were nearly one, trials were shoveled in the snow for walkways, and how Ole Shep would stand in the trail and make people walk around him.

And he would talk about the team of little mules he once had, named Tom and Jeff. And how he entered them in a pulling contest. He said a loaded wagon would have corn cobs placed in front of each wheel and the team would be hitched to the end of the wagon tongue. And he gestured with his hands as he told how these little mules would squat real low, and pull together until they moved the wagon.

Gordon Lloyd Reasor:
My very first memory of Dad is of his coming in from the field while I was quite young, probably about 4. He would sit in the straight backed hickory bottomed chair between the kitchen table, and the wood box and the cook stove. And Lee and I would run and climb upon his lap and wrestle and play with him. While he laughed loudly, he always did. And Mom would look up from her cooking with approving glances.