A Farm Life Recounted

Written By Berenice Bergkamp

I learned to hand milk from my parents as I was growing up.  My sisters and I only milked in the summer months.  At that time, we had a very up-to-date dairy parlor (because my dad was a Grade A dairy producer) that was all cemented with a waste trough that was easily cleaned up after milking plus metal stanchions and a cement feeding manger.

After Albin and I were married in 1949, we moved to our own home and dairy barn.  What a shock--a shed, no door (very air conditioned), with stanchions and a dirt floor.  When it rained, the dirt floor was muddy and slick.  One evening, the cow I was milking slipped and this scared her.  She kicked me with so much force, I ended outside with no serious injuries.  I had Helen and Joan in a 3 bushel wash tub and they were frightened.  I'll have to admit, Helen Ann, Joan, and Byron were good, sitting in that tub for maybe 2 hours at the most, depending on how many cows I had to milk.  Albin milked cows for his folks in the morning and evening.  We milked our cows together in the morning, and as a rule, the children slept through morning hours, then he milked Fred's.

In the early summer of 1956, we found out we had to move because the farm was sold.  The man who bought it was gambling that the government would pay a huge price for it.  Our house location was supposedly the spot of the deepest part of what was to become the Cheney Reservoir.

There were no farm homes available.  In desperation, Albin and I started a 10 day novena.  On a Sunday morning, the last day of our novena, we felt as if we had been forgotten.  But that Sunday evening, Gerhardt F. Schmitz came over to visit with us to see if we would be interested to move on his farm which was a mile north and 1/4 mile west of St. Joe. Immediately, we went with Gerhardt to see the house.  It was Heaven to us!  Yes, we would have a roof over our heads;  but no windows because they had been shot out.  The north wall of the living room was a solid mass of bullet holes, but Albie and I were ecstatic.  From that day on, we have always remembered Gerhardt in our daily prayers.

Aunt Annie [Friess] told us that she thought we were crazy moving to this deserted, run down farm.  But we started by putting in windows and cleaning up the dead birds and bird nests. We were so happy!

There were stanchions in the old barn.  We made the necessary improvements and moved in on a dusty hot September day in 1956.  At that time, Albin was having trouble trying to make his fingers move in order to hand milk.

When Greg was born February 8, 1958, Albin could milk only a couple of easy strippers.  Aunt Barb Beat helped me so I could get rested up--for 3 days--and back to the barn 8 days later. Luckily, Albie was able to carry the milk for me.

By summer, 17 cows were being milked.  That was time to think of De Laval bucket milkers. Helen Ann was 7, Joan 5, Byron 3, and Greg, a baby--so they weren't old enough to help.  Mr. Tatro did the installation and we bought a milk cooler and 8 cows from John Mies.  It was getting easier--Albie was still able to carry milk to the cooler in the grainery.

In a couple years time, Albie was getting much weaker, fighting for air, and experiencing difficulty chewing and swallowing.  His eyes would be closed by noon and his voice very weak and he was almost too weak to walk.  Dr. Al Biermann suspected MG (myasthenia gravis), a grave muscular weakness.

At that time, I decided we needed to upgrade the dairy and build a barn close to the house where I could keep a closer eye on my family.  While we were building the barn in August and September of 1961, two of our carpenters, Uncle Hugo Nett and Frank Heimermann, insisted that I get Albie to the hospital before it was too late.  My brother Martin took us to the hospital.  On our way, as we passed St. Joe, I told Albie that Dr. Biermann said he had to be checked into St. Francis hospital.  He had his arm around me but when I told him that, he pinched me!  A very unhappy husband at that point.  After doing the tensilon test, it was confirmed that he was an advanced MG patient.  It was possible that he had it since his mid-teens and could live only 5 years at the most.  We decided St. Jude would prove the doctors wrong!  (Now my kids will know why we included St. Jude, among others, in our prayers at every meal and evening.)  Albie had to live to see his children grow up!

The medication really helped but the doctors said something else was still wrong.  The drugs needed were called orphan drugs--new drugs needed for rare diseases.  (I never did tell Albie I spent $200.00 per month for medications or he would not have taken them.)  Later, he was also diagnosed as a Parkinson patient.  The doctors didn't want to believe that he could have two stress diseases at one time.

Yes, we had the barn completed in October.  It was great.  It had overhead feeding and a pit barn plan.  We bought the Pyrex pipeline, bulk tank, and 25 diary cows from Mr. Krehbiel. After culling some, we ended up with 45 head and started milking 41.  Also that year, Gerhardt gave us the entire farm to till.

With the help of my Co-pilot, everything was working out, even though we had a huge debt and with the milk price at $3.85 per hundred pounds.  We paid $359.00 to AMPI and the bank monthly and $200 per month to Dr. Al Biermann.  Sometimes, I scolded my Co-pilot, the good Lord, but he never let me down completely.  The closest call I had was the time I was mowing the pasture and I got too close to the dam.  I felt the tractor slipping and about to tip. Suddenly it seemed to upright itself with the precision help from my Co-pilot and Guardian Angel.  Twenty some years later, I still have nightmares similar to that.

In 1968, we bought the 160 acres on a 10 year contract from Gerhardt Schmitz.  By 1982, Helen, Joan, and Greg had been through college and Byron through Jr. College.  Byron had been helping Walt Back full-time since he was 14 years old and was now farming on his own. Albie was getting progressively worse and I quit dairying.  What a let down!  It took me six weeks to adjust and get over what seemed like morning sickness.

On March 27, 1985, during Greg's Spring Break at the University of Chicago, we had our farm sale.  Albie was now needing 24 hour care.  We, Byron and I, really worked getting ready for the sale.  John and Flo and Martin and Pat Hampel very well know that preparing for a farm sale is hard work since they have gone though farm sales also.  The dairy quote, "Everything we have we owe to udders" is not a joke, it is so true!  By now, Byron will agree.

Helen, Joan, Byron, and Greg were real workers.  Helen Ann was a very good dairy maid, starting at 10 years of age.  Joan was the cook and housekeeper.  When she was 8 and 9 years old, she stood on a stool to cook, fry chicken, wash dishes, or whatever.  Byron was the one who loved feeding cows or repairing machinery.

After Helen and Joan went to college and Byron was working for Walt Back, Greg was my right hand man.  He could milk, roll out pie shells better than I, and if I didn't watch him closely, he was always remodeling the old barn, living room, or whatever else he could take a hammer to. Yes, the biggest and greatest blessings Albie and I had in our marriage were our four children. Now we even have 19 grandchildren.

For the benefit of my children and grandchildren, I'm enclosing a letter, written by their dad or grandfather, to me when we were dating [see the Bergkamp Archives section].  Now they will realize that he was not always a dad or grandfather who couldn't speak or write.  Notice his wit.

Through the years of our marriage, I always remembered the following quote by Robert Louis Stevenson: "Life is not a matter of holding good cards but of playing a poor hand well."

(This story was written in 1993.)