My Gram's Potato Harvest Memories ~A Maine Post

My Gram, Ruby Smith Sjoberg, was born in East Hodgdon, Maine in 1918.
Born & raised on the very same, dead-end, dirt road that I was raised on.
A farmer's daughter & a farmer's wife.

(photo credit to Adam Sjoberg)

She moved on to heaven in 2012 at the age of 94.

A couple of years before she died I was able to extract some Potato Harvest Memories, and here they are:

"My father was a potato farmer as well as a dairy farmer.  When I was about 9 or 10 years old, our neighbor was hurt seriously on the day that my dad was finishing digging his potatoes.  To learn that Maurice Duff, our dear neighbor, had gotten his foot caught in the thrashing machine was devastating news to our families and the whole community."

(To be clear, this pic is of Great-Grandpa Smith, my Gram's dad, fooling around.  Therefore, not really related to the sad story above it.  And that... is my Gram's finger!)

"Farmers used one row, horse-drawn diggers.  County schools didn't start until after the first week of October.  My dad never wanted his girls to be picking.  It wasn't for females.  Later on, as a young teen, I did pick for a day or two for neighbors.  My dad said, "Well, if you're going to pick potatoes, you might as well pick for me!"

"Three weeks after my marriage, my husband, Wally, got his foot caught in the power take-off, during the potato harvest.  Crushed bones in his food lead to many operations, a long recovery, some deformity, and permanent pain and a permanent limp."

"At the stage of being the wife of a potato farmer, my involvement in the field was mostly to drive the truck while barrels were being loaded on, preparing lots of good food for hungry people, keeping all the dirty clothes washed, and warm clothes available."

To read more about the Potato Harvest, please check out this blogpost:

http://carmelhillbillies.blogspot.com/2013/09/potato-harvest-maine-post.html