By KAREN MADORIN
Like motes floating in late afternoon sunlight, stories of surviving the Dust Bowl permeated my childhood.
Once we moved to California, when I was 9, knowing real people who survived those events offered serious creds in 8th and 11th grade American history classes. Teachers and fellow students wanted the scoop on what those days were really like for both sides of my families.
Gramma Lottie’s daily menu—oatmeal for breakfast, beans for supper, and homemade bread smeared with lard for lunch when they had it--impressed no one. The stories of sun-blocking, choking dust were more than most native Californians could conceive.
A recent literary club discussion revived some of those remembered stories I’d tucked into my mind’s dark corners now that grandparents, parents, aunts, and uncles who lived through those days have passed. I haven’t buried all those recollections as I still can’t pass a deep road cut in this part of the state without searching upper soil layers to wonder exactly where the Dust Bowl intersects with other collected historical eras.
That book talk led to a later conversation with another native Kansan from this region. She’s a generation behind me, a peer of our daughters, but she too cut her teeth hearing the stories of hanging wet sheets over windows to keep dust out or putting a damp cover over a baby crib to protect tiny lungs.
I thought my father embellished his tales of single light bulbs hanging from the middle of the room, but her grandparents had drilled into their kids and, as a result, their grandchildren, the necessity for turning THE LIGHT off when you left a room. Clearly, Dust Bowl survivors didn’t leave a light on for folks.
Our discussion led to reports of Ford County residents whose ceilings collapsed in recent years because of decades of accumulated dust.
My friend shared that that happened at their Rush County farm house when she was an elementary student. Their century-old home survived the Dust Bowl and other dirt storms. During the late 1980s or early '90s, old lathe and plaster caved to the accumulated weight. Even as a grownup with kids of her own, she vividly recalls her parents cleaning the mess and repairing damages.
Her story reminded me of our first home in Ellis.
It too survived storms that darkened daylight and made breathing more than a challenge. When we put a new roof on, my husband shoveled piles of fine soil out of our attic. When hubs and his dad removed a gable window, dirt filled every crevice of that frame. I’m grateful they cleaned before that mess took out our ceiling.
Not everyone’s home precedes the Dust Bowl, but we all know people whose home did.
Ask questions. What evidence lingers from those harsh days? What lessons did our elders learn and share that we can use to help us handle adversity?
These folks raised families without triple-paned windows combined with central heat and air to filter dust. Somehow, they fed themselves even in years without measurable rain.
Oh, and if your house is old enough to have collected bushels of dirt in the attic, you might want to transfer some of that to the yard.
Karen Madorin is a retired teacher, writer, photographer, outdoors lover, and sixth-generation Kansan.