David McElwain wanted to leave something of himself to his grandchildren, a record of the way he lived way back when. He started years ago, just pecking out notes on an old manual typewriter. The notes have evolved into a meticulously crafted memoir that describes everything from trips to the outhouse on frigid mornings to the operation of a push lawn mower.
David McElwain wanted to leave something of himself to his grandchildren, a record of the way he lived way back when. He started years ago, just pecking out notes on an old manual typewriter. The notes have evolved into a meticulously crafted memoir that describes everything from trips to the outhouse on frigid mornings to the operation of a push lawn mower.
A longtime agriculture teacher and vocational director in Braxton County, he wrote extensively about the polio that struck him at age 6 and how he overcame the limitations of his withered leg. He wrote about his years at WVU, how he worked his way through school on a pittance.
Still adding to the chronicle at 83, the past pours from his productive mind like milk from a cow's udder. (He wrote about milking cows, of course). He hopes his grandchildren will learn from his memories. Maybe the grit and resourcefulness that got him through life will inspire them.
"I was born March 7, 1925, on a little dairy farm outside of Sutton. My parents decided they were too young to mess with children, so they handed me over to my grandparents. This was right before the Depression. We didn't have much money, but we had plenty to eat because we raised it. We milked eight to 10 cows and we would butcher five or six a year and five or six steers.
"The only heat we had was an open grate. We burned coal and wood. I remember going with my uncle up through Sutton and hauling coal with a team of horses. It took us almost all day to make a trip up there for one load of coal.
"In the summer, sometimes the well would go dry. My grandmother would take clothes to the river with a couple of washtubs and build a fire under one of them. While she washed clothes, I would play in the river, so I learned to swim at a very early age.
"When we got running water, my first shower was in the basement with a cold water hose stuck in a coffee can that I had punched holes in with a nail and hung from the ceiling.
"Our house was built of poplar. The floor was wide boards with a crack between them. We didn't have a basement. The parlor floor had a rug on it, but when the wind would blow, that rug would raise up from the wind going under the house.
"I had no contact with my father, and very little with my mother. It bothered me a lot. That's one part of my life I don't dwell on.
"When I was 6, I had polio. I had just started to school. Coming home one evening, I fell. A couple of days after that, I couldn't stand up on my leg. The next day, I couldn't walk. The doctor immediately told her it was infantile paralysis, which is what they called it at that time. I didn't go to school that year. They made a brace for my leg that went clear up around my waist. I was in the hospital maybe two months.
"They closed the school and disinfected it. They burnt sulfur to fumigate the classroom. The doctor placed a quarantine on our house. My uncle lived up the road and dad took all the milk supplies up there and didn't come back until the quarantine was lifted. My grandmother said they lost a lot of customers because people were afraid. The next fall, I started first grade again. I had a brace and walked on crutches about a mile and a half to the grade school.
David McElwain wanted to leave something of himself to his grandchildren, a record of the way he lived way back when. He started years ago, just pecking out notes on an old manual typewriter. The notes have evolved into a meticulously crafted memoir that describes everything from trips to the outhouse on frigid mornings to the operation of a push lawn mower.
A longtime agriculture teacher and vocational director in Braxton County, he wrote extensively about the polio that struck him at age 6 and how he overcame the limitations of his withered leg. He wrote about his years at WVU, how he worked his way through school on a pittance.
Still adding to the chronicle at 83, the past pours from his productive mind like milk from a cow's udder. (He wrote about milking cows, of course). He hopes his grandchildren will learn from his memories. Maybe the grit and resourcefulness that got him through life will inspire them.
"I was born March 7, 1925, on a little dairy farm outside of Sutton. My parents decided they were too young to mess with children, so they handed me over to my grandparents. This was right before the Depression. We didn't have much money, but we had plenty to eat because we raised it. We milked eight to 10 cows and we would butcher five or six a year and five or six steers.
"The only heat we had was an open grate. We burned coal and wood. I remember going with my uncle up through Sutton and hauling coal with a team of horses. It took us almost all day to make a trip up there for one load of coal.
"In the summer, sometimes the well would go dry. My grandmother would take clothes to the river with a couple of washtubs and build a fire under one of them. While she washed clothes, I would play in the river, so I learned to swim at a very early age.
"When we got running water, my first shower was in the basement with a cold water hose stuck in a coffee can that I had punched holes in with a nail and hung from the ceiling.
"Our house was built of poplar. The floor was wide boards with a crack between them. We didn't have a basement. The parlor floor had a rug on it, but when the wind would blow, that rug would raise up from the wind going under the house.
"I had no contact with my father, and very little with my mother. It bothered me a lot. That's one part of my life I don't dwell on.
"When I was 6, I had polio. I had just started to school. Coming home one evening, I fell. A couple of days after that, I couldn't stand up on my leg. The next day, I couldn't walk. The doctor immediately told her it was infantile paralysis, which is what they called it at that time. I didn't go to school that year. They made a brace for my leg that went clear up around my waist. I was in the hospital maybe two months.
"They closed the school and disinfected it. They burnt sulfur to fumigate the classroom. The doctor placed a quarantine on our house. My uncle lived up the road and dad took all the milk supplies up there and didn't come back until the quarantine was lifted. My grandmother said they lost a lot of customers because people were afraid. The next fall, I started first grade again. I had a brace and walked on crutches about a mile and a half to the grade school.
"I couldn't go out for sports, but I loved the farm work. Whatever my grandfather was doing, I was right under his footsteps with my brace and crutches. I loved to work with the horse. When we hauled cow manure to the field, my grandfather would put poles on the sled and let the runners run way out behind the sled. He would put a little board on each one so I could have a place for both legs and the lines from the horses gave me enough balance. I could stand on those sled runners and drive the horse to the field.
"One time, my grandfather got the flu and started to plow two acres of bottomland. It took about a day to plow an acre with horses. I was only about 11 or 12, and he let me plow. The collar around the horse's neck had two prongs, called hames, and I would hang my crutches on each one of them and use the plow handles to help me walk.
"After an operation at 13, I was able to throw away the crutches for a cane. I did just about everything anyone else could do, except it was a little slower and I had to do some rigging. I still have to do some rigging. About 10 years ago, my son-in-law bought a used tractor, and it was real hard to put the clutch in. My leg wasn't strong enough. So I made a hand clutch to attach to the foot clutch, and it worked even better than the foot clutch. So all my life, I have rigged up things to work for my leg.
"The Gazette carrier stopped at the house one day, and I was walking on crutches. I was probably 6 or 7. He said, 'Young man, you are going to have to get an education, because you aren't going to be able to do anything except sit at a desk. You won't even be able drive a car.' Of course, by the time I was 14, I was driving cars.
"I wanted to be a science teacher. My senior year at Gassaway High School, I didn't have much choice of classes to take that I hadn't already taken. The fellow enrolling me was a vocational agriculture teacher. He said to just sign up for his class. I liked it so well I decided I wanted to be a vo-ag teacher. I wouldn't be able to make a living farming with my condition, but I would still be connected with farming.
"Food was scarce during the war. I took on 500 broiler chickens for my senior vo-ag enterprise project, sold them at the end of my senior year and made enough to buy clothes for college. I went to West Virginia University. The vo-ag teacher got me a Sears Roebuck scholarship for $100. The state rehabilitation service took care of my tuition.
"My first year in college, I worked in Women's Hall, washing dishes for my meals. The second year, I worked for a lumber company, grading lumber. I didn't have a job that gave me meals, so I ate a lot of peanut butter sandwiches and donuts. I could get a fish sandwich, potato salad and an RC at a sandwich shop for 25 cents. The ag school's dairy department had a place where I could buy a pint of chocolate milk for a nickel. I lived on $2 or $3 a week for food that semester. The rest of the time, I worked in the cafeteria to get my meals.
"I lived in the dorm the first year, then in a private home. Rehab paid half my room, which was $4 a week. I had to come up with $2. All the time I was there, I had a job in the agriculture extension service headquarters, testing soil and feed samples. They paid me 50 cents an hour.
"I taught vo-ag at Sutton three years. The first year I taught, my take home pay was $180 a month. I was never really accepted there by some teachers from aristocratic families who knew me as a little poor child from the wrong side of the tracks without a father. In 1952, I was transferred to Gassaway, where I had been a good student, so all the teachers liked me. I stayed 16 years. When the vocational classes moved to the consolidated high school, I taught there for 21 years and was vocational director for 19 years.
"If I hadn't had polio, I might have been a farmer. But I'm pretty satisfied with everything. Under my circumstances, born in poverty and having polio and working my way through college, I think my story is that I was able to do what I did."
Reach Sandy Wells at 348-5173 or e-mail san...@wvgazette.com.
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