Opheim, Montana
Home and School
When the 1932-33 school year ended, Pluma, Edna Fern, Lyman, Bob, and Lela moved back to their Rock Creek home from Opheim for the summer to help with planting another crop and another kitchen garden, berry picking, canning, and all the other fieldwork and chores that needed doing. Edna Fern hoped that she would get to spend time with Ernest who would be home after completing his first year of university in Saskatoon.
She wrote that Ernest did frequent the Haverfield home that summer: “It didn’t take any effort to entertain Ernest as he enjoyed Mother’s cooking and visiting with Dad. All I had to do was sit with them listening intently, and nod and smile once in a while. Ernest would help me with the dishes in those days, and as he wiped them dry, he would recite poetry; this amused me, as I had never known another boy like that. One time a giggle was gurgling up inside me and I knew I couldn’t stop it so I jerked my hands out of the dishwater and ran into the other room. Ernest kept right on reciting his poem and didn’t even notice I wasn’t there listening to him.” That fall, Ernest resumed his university studies. His goal was to become a United Church minister, and his grandmother Eliza was covering his expenses.
Pluma moved the family back to Opheim when school resumed in the fall of 1933, so that Lyman and Bob could continue high school and Lela could start grade two. It was the beginning of the Depression that took hold on both sides of the border, and jobs were scarce, so Edna Fern also went to Opheim and took post-graduate courses at the same high school as her brothers attended: “My marks were high since I was taking subjects I liked: typing, Latin, and social studies. It was a little embarrassing, as I had a part-time job helping out with the office work and I was the person who put up the notice each month of those with the highest averages.”
She wrote that Ernest did frequent the Haverfield home that summer: “It didn’t take any effort to entertain Ernest as he enjoyed Mother’s cooking and visiting with Dad. All I had to do was sit with them listening intently, and nod and smile once in a while. Ernest would help me with the dishes in those days, and as he wiped them dry, he would recite poetry; this amused me, as I had never known another boy like that. One time a giggle was gurgling up inside me and I knew I couldn’t stop it so I jerked my hands out of the dishwater and ran into the other room. Ernest kept right on reciting his poem and didn’t even notice I wasn’t there listening to him.” That fall, Ernest resumed his university studies. His goal was to become a United Church minister, and his grandmother Eliza was covering his expenses.
Pluma moved the family back to Opheim when school resumed in the fall of 1933, so that Lyman and Bob could continue high school and Lela could start grade two. It was the beginning of the Depression that took hold on both sides of the border, and jobs were scarce, so Edna Fern also went to Opheim and took post-graduate courses at the same high school as her brothers attended: “My marks were high since I was taking subjects I liked: typing, Latin, and social studies. It was a little embarrassing, as I had a part-time job helping out with the office work and I was the person who put up the notice each month of those with the highest averages.”
Pluma was throughout her life a great letter writer, and her daughter Edna Fern carried on this family tradition.
Edna Fern went on, “I remember that school year with affection. My brothers and I were all in our teens—Lyman turned 17 in January, Bob was 15, and I was 19. We sang in the Lutheran choir; Lyman and Bob could sing but I didn’t have much of a singing voice. We attended the Epworth League for young people in the Methodist church. There were parties at the school, and the teachers were good to us. We classmates were always welcome in one another’s homes, and we would invite one another for humble meals. One evening I was invited for supper at the Telford residence, and we just had eggs and bread, a supper that was especially humble. However, when Vivien and Flo walked home with me after supper, I found a house full of guests—it was a surprise party!” That winter wasn’t easy in terms of paying the bills, but there were good times nonetheless.
Edna Fern’s paltry salary also helped with expenses, and though she couldn’t afford to buy new clothes she wrote, “I’d always had a flair for how I dressed; I liked to wear colorful blouses and scarves and hats. But when I got tired of the few clothes I had, I borrowed something from my brothers to wear and this started a fad at the school. I was one of the oldest students in the school, and they knew that I’d lived in a town out on the West Coast, so they must have thought I was more stylish and other girls followed my lead.”
There was also deep sorrow. Lela remembered coming home from school to find her mother and Uncle Ralph crouched on the stairs bawling their eyes out. Ralph had already lost one wife to an early death, and now his second wife, Stella, had died during childbirth, leaving Ralph with four children to raise. Lela said, “Mother had known her own share of sorrow in her life, and she felt deeply for Ralph and his children; she took this very hard.” Ralph couldn’t cope so his first four children were sent to live with other family members. Dorothy went to live with her mother’s married sister, Frieda Petersen (Henry) in the Wood Mountain area of Saskatchewan, and her sister Lucille followed Burton to Idaho to be raised by him and his wife Edna. Their younger half-brothers who had just lost their mother, Lester who was an infant and Leslie who was two or three years of age, went to live with their mother’s Jackson family in Minnesota.
At the end of the 1932-33 school year in Opheim, the principal gave Edna Fern a two-month scholarship to North Western Business School in Spokane, Washington. She wrote, “It never occurred to me not to go, even though I had no money. I worked that spring for only a couple of weeks in a government office in Opheim where farmers were able to get loans for seed grain, but my earnings paid off the grocery bill my mother had incurred by having to charge a few grocery staples over the winter. It was worth it, because nothing could have made Mother happier on her birthday that April than to receive the grocery bill marked PAID. Mother was not one to go into debt unless it was absolutely necessary, but that winter it had been. Because I worked in the school office, the principal understood our family’s financial situation and not only presented me with the business school scholarship but also arranged for my train fare to Spokane and for me to work for my board for the two months I would be studying there.”
After her secretarial training in Spokane, Edna Fern stayed in that city for a year working at the Armours meatpacking plant and saved enough for a further year of education. She spent 1934-35 at the Nazarene College in Nampa, Idaho, where she took courses in English, music, and religion and worked as an assistant in the president’s office.
Edna Fern’s paltry salary also helped with expenses, and though she couldn’t afford to buy new clothes she wrote, “I’d always had a flair for how I dressed; I liked to wear colorful blouses and scarves and hats. But when I got tired of the few clothes I had, I borrowed something from my brothers to wear and this started a fad at the school. I was one of the oldest students in the school, and they knew that I’d lived in a town out on the West Coast, so they must have thought I was more stylish and other girls followed my lead.”
There was also deep sorrow. Lela remembered coming home from school to find her mother and Uncle Ralph crouched on the stairs bawling their eyes out. Ralph had already lost one wife to an early death, and now his second wife, Stella, had died during childbirth, leaving Ralph with four children to raise. Lela said, “Mother had known her own share of sorrow in her life, and she felt deeply for Ralph and his children; she took this very hard.” Ralph couldn’t cope so his first four children were sent to live with other family members. Dorothy went to live with her mother’s married sister, Frieda Petersen (Henry) in the Wood Mountain area of Saskatchewan, and her sister Lucille followed Burton to Idaho to be raised by him and his wife Edna. Their younger half-brothers who had just lost their mother, Lester who was an infant and Leslie who was two or three years of age, went to live with their mother’s Jackson family in Minnesota.
At the end of the 1932-33 school year in Opheim, the principal gave Edna Fern a two-month scholarship to North Western Business School in Spokane, Washington. She wrote, “It never occurred to me not to go, even though I had no money. I worked that spring for only a couple of weeks in a government office in Opheim where farmers were able to get loans for seed grain, but my earnings paid off the grocery bill my mother had incurred by having to charge a few grocery staples over the winter. It was worth it, because nothing could have made Mother happier on her birthday that April than to receive the grocery bill marked PAID. Mother was not one to go into debt unless it was absolutely necessary, but that winter it had been. Because I worked in the school office, the principal understood our family’s financial situation and not only presented me with the business school scholarship but also arranged for my train fare to Spokane and for me to work for my board for the two months I would be studying there.”
After her secretarial training in Spokane, Edna Fern stayed in that city for a year working at the Armours meatpacking plant and saved enough for a further year of education. She spent 1934-35 at the Nazarene College in Nampa, Idaho, where she took courses in English, music, and religion and worked as an assistant in the president’s office.
Candles on a Christmas tree.
Pluma’s second year in Opheim with Lyman, Bob, and Lela (1933-34) was not free of worries, but she and Percy never let their worries defeat them. Lela remembered how thrilled she and her brothers were at Christmas time that year—they had their first Christmas tree with candles in holders attached to the branches. She was then eight years old, and her parents let her pass out the gifts that Ruth and Edna Fern had sent. When she bent over a little too close to the candles, her dress caught fire. Luckily, the fire was quickly put out, and aside from a ruined dress no harm was done.
The incident was soon forgotten when the gifts were opened. Lela received a Shirley Temple doll and a buggy to push her “baby” around in; the buggy later became a mending basket. Lyman’s special gift was a ukulele, and Bob found a harmonica in his stocking.
“Mother went back and forth between the farm and Opheim,” Lela recalled, “but with another failed crop and the Depression on top of that the decision was made to leave the farm. Percy sold the Dort and the horses that he couldn’t afford to feed in Opheim and then bought a second-hand Buick to drive around the countryside on both sides of the border in search of employment.”
The incident was soon forgotten when the gifts were opened. Lela received a Shirley Temple doll and a buggy to push her “baby” around in; the buggy later became a mending basket. Lyman’s special gift was a ukulele, and Bob found a harmonica in his stocking.
“Mother went back and forth between the farm and Opheim,” Lela recalled, “but with another failed crop and the Depression on top of that the decision was made to leave the farm. Percy sold the Dort and the horses that he couldn’t afford to feed in Opheim and then bought a second-hand Buick to drive around the countryside on both sides of the border in search of employment.”
Shirley Temple doll.