A little more explaining

I Didnt want to start a typing war the other night,,,but I feel like I should tell some more history of Hugo the old farmer,and his two brothers. Yes,,,Hugo was filthy dirty,the farm was a mess,,no denying that. But ,,,Hugo never drank a drop of alcohal,,never smoked,,,and ate only natural foods from the farm.That video,was filmed a while ago,he was in his 80 s then and lived a looong time after that. He never took subsidies never took welfare,,he worked nights in a plastic factory till he was in his late 70s and farmed in the daytime. The factory didnt want him to leave,,no one could outwork him. He had two brothers .ALL of them ,including Hugo,,were legally blind and their mother had vision problems too. They all liked to go to farm auctions,my dad and I And my brother took them to many of them,,,ANY,,and I mean ANY box of stuff that went for 50 cents or 1 dollar..was theirs,,,hense ,,some of the mess at the farm,,,lol, Hugo didnt drink a drop,,,but the two brothers Henry and Clarence did like to tip some when company arrived at the farm.I never saw them have one when there was no company, I didnt drink, was young,and was with them all day many times,they didnt drink if company didnt stop in to pass one around.They were sloppy,,,but smarter then they looked,,,Clarence was voted Mayor of the town in 1956 and did some great accoplishments for the town,Hugo graduated high school with top honors,and I can tell you for a fact he put many a people to shame talking of history,doing any math in his head,debating current subjects in the news,,,no one could come close.His place was a mess,but his animals were well fed,,the sack he was carrying was full of stale bread he fed to his geese,he bought the best high protien dog food,his dog coups looked rough,,but they got straw in the winter,plenty of food and water,,,believe me. Hugos brother Henry could see less than sny of them,never left the farm to work,,but worked very hard at the farm,One day he tried to run the tractor with no one home,he got too close to the stream a the tractor rolled on top of him,he was pinned and bruised but ok,,Hugo came home from work,,found him,,,lifted the tractor off of him..These are just a few things that I know about them,there are many,,many more stories. Hugo was the last brother living,he was getting old,They had no children or relatives,but lots of friends.Clarence died ,he owned three houses up the road from the farm,he left them to Hugo.A young carpenter lived in one of the houses.Hugo still had a cow,,but was getting old to milk it,The boy knew how much Hugo depended on fresh raw milk,He stopped in everyday before and after work to milk and feed the cow. When Hugo passed on,,he left that boy Clarences three houses.Hugo left money to the fire department,rescue squad,,,and left the old farm to the town and stated he wanted the land to be for young people of the town forever.The town made soccer and baseball fields in the hayfields,the old barn and house is still there.I am not ashamed to show a video of this man,messy and sloppy dirty as he was,,,I really knew him,,and am very proud to have known him,,,
I felt it was my duty as their friend to tell some more history because there was a lot more to these people than meets the eye,It was truely an honor to have known them.,and I will never forget them.

Reminds me a story of 3 bachelor brothers in ND; there was also a sister that lived with them and kept house for them. One of the brothers went into the city one day wearing his greasy old bib overalls. He went to the Mercury dealer and wandered around the showroom; the salesmen ignored him for a bum. Finally one salesman went out and talked to him; they sat down and agreed on the price and the guy pulled out a big roll of bills and paid for the car. The next day the two brothers came in dressed in greasy clothes and each bought a new car for cash. That was one happy salesmen!

The story went around that whenever they ordered a refill on the farm fuel storage tank, the delivery driver knew where to look for a jar full of cash, where he could take out the amount owed for the fuel. They farmed with 3 identical Massey Harris 55 tractors in those days.

This was some years ago; nowadays they'd have every government agency after them.

That saying "You can,t judge a book by its cover" applies hear I think. Loos are not everything . Sounds like a real guy to have known . Merry Christmas

Years ago at a funeral near here, someone was asking about the poor tall slim guy standing there in scruffy clothes and shoes with no socks. Someone told them that they were looking at the richest man in the county who owned most of the buildings in the largest town in the county.
Thanks Larry for telling about your friends.
Richard in NW SC

There are characters like that in most communities. They may be a bit rough around the edges, but within beats a heart of gold. They can be compared to a piece of coal on its way to become a diamond, and their departure is our loss. RIP all Hugo's everywhere.

Ben

Larry, I knew two brother farmers very similar to your friends. Never married and died millionaires.

JimB

It is all a matter of priorities. Many times I have found people that may seem less than clean or have rundown looking places to be the hardest working and have hearts of gold.

Larry, the other night when you posted the video's I remembered a documentary on TV about some brothers in New York that farmed. I think you would enjoy watching, finally found on youtube yesterday. John
Ward Brothers

I'm a fairly new model at 48 years old. I consider
Myself lucky to have known some characters like that. That type of folk were in every part of the country. And God bless them for that. You don't realize what they accomplished or represented until they're gone. I'm reading the history of my home town and have realized the exclusion of a lot of those types. My 90 year mother and I disscussed this shortcoming of the book and reminisced about several of the cornerstones and characters of our community. Central Mn is home and "Lake Wobegon" still oozes out of these parts. Keillor did a fine job, but he missed ALOT of good material. Let's hope people like that live on in ourselves and our stories.

One thing that impressed me when I watched the videos was how happy Hugo appeared to be. We have a saying "as if in their right mind". He was probably more in his right mind and a lot happier than a lot of people.

I heard a story that back in the 50s 2 high school kids involved in a fund raiser, for FFA perhaps, stopped at a local business to see if they could make a sale. A sweaty old barefoot shirtless guy with bibs was weeding the flower beds outside the building asked them what they wanted, so they told him what they were doing. When they did, without a word he got into a pocket, pulled out a check, and wrote them out a check for $100. They thanked him and went on into the business. They were laughing and joking to the man at the window in the business office and wondering where that old "bum" got a hold of a check and if there was any chance of it being good. The man asked to look at it and then told them that it had better be good. The man that wrote it was Harvey Jones and he owned the bank the check was written on, not to mention the building they were standing in and dozens more "Jones Truck Line" terminals around the country. (as told by JTL employee Bud Castor back in the 70s) gm

Could someone please post a link to the video. I can't find it now.

I think this is the same Harvey Jones./

http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=5582#

I can't find it either.
what are key words to search for in youtube?

I finally found the video of Hugo. It brought to mind a few folk from the past, good, simple folk. I also noticed this topic stirred some opinion. One thing is for sure, farming is not what it used to be. Our Americam country was settled and developed east to west mostly by agriculture. Granted there was the lure of mineral and lumber, but most settlers were agricultural. Agriculture has changed from , in my opinion, a community setting of small farms to a churning setting of big farms. I applaude those that are farmers! I miss the days of small farm neighborhoods, and can only speculate where agriculture will be in the future. Congratulations to Hugo to be able to live the way he chose to! I did notice that some of the civic organizations have recognized Duderstadt place for its barn. That's good to see. My Grandpa was a builder / farmer in the last century and I carry on the builder tradition. I enjoy the old architecture more than today's and appreciate the preservation.

Search "A dying breed" on you tube.

Try this Tom (Hope it works).
If nothing else, copy and paste. There are 2 videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvLZEQwuKtg

and

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMfFCJ7kI3U
LB Woods

Thanks Larry for sharing the story of Hugo it was very interesting.
When I was younger, some 60 years ago, we had several farmers in the area like Hugo and I like you found them very interesting. I was probably more impressed by the ladies who farmed alone. Around here we had 4 that come to mind back then. Most of them were foreign born, Czechoslovakian, Italian or Scandinavian. Most of them had smaller farms and milked a few cows and did all the work by themselves. One I remember and used to visit often, milked about 10 cows and also had a large herd of beef cattle a couple teams of horses and a riding horse. Even when she was over 80 years old she still could ride a horse bareback. All of these ladies would go to town once a week to buy groceries and other things they needed. Another thing that always amazed me was that all of these women were small in stature but were still able to work like a man. When I was a youngster and started driving I always enjoyed going to visit them and help them with whatever they were doing at the time. Most of their places were not neat but they all took good care of their animals.
Nowadays they're all gone and I can't name one man or woman living alone and still farming. I guess those days have passed and I miss it. It was always an education to visit and talk with these old-timers when I was a kid.

Yup, I knew one just like them, was a welder of renown. Besides the farm sold welding supplies and did all types of welding. Was one of those guys that told all kind of stories that you didn't believe but eventually found out were true. He invented and patented a snow making gun, was part of the group that first mounted a bucket on a log skidder to cut trees along power lines. He also raised competition hunting dogs and went to field trials. The farm looked like heck even the silo he built from salvaged steel plate but all the animals were in good shape and he knew where everything was. The house looked like it was abandoned, but I spent quite a few days sitting in the dining room listening to stories and sometimes he shared his, as he called it "mathigla" or a beverage from fermented honey.

Just watched it. Thanks for posting.

thanks,, I watched it,,,tractor related too! Farmall and an Oliver,,,,it was a really well done story covereage,,,thanks,,,,

I guess we all got a story like that. We had an old farmer up on the hill about a mile or so from our place and us boys thought he was god. He lived alone and it was dirty in the house. About 5 or 6 baskets of ashes on the kitchen floor with a lot of Mail Pouch chewing tobacco used wads on the top. .Us boys would go up there every chance we got as we liked him and believed every thing he told us. It a lot of years later that we relized he fed us a line some times. Any way the reason we thought he was great is because he would let us sware and smoke and we also helped him drink some of his hard cider .There are a lot more story's I could tell about the old guy. He is dead and gone now but we still miss him and we talk about him often.

(quoted from post at 15:36:45 12/20/15) I guess we all got a story like that. We had an old farmer up on the hill about a mile or so from our place and us boys thought he was god. He lived alone and it was dirty in the house. About 5 or 6 baskets of ashes on the kitchen floor with a lot of Mail Pouch chewing tobacco used wads on the top. .Us boys would go up there every chance we got as we liked him and believed every thing he told us. It a lot of years later that we relized he fed us a line some times. Any way the reason we thought he was great is because he would let us sware and smoke and we also helped him drink some of his hard cider .There are a lot more story's I could tell about the old guy. He is dead and gone now but we still miss him and we talk about him often.

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I believe that when you pass and SOME one, even after many years, remembers you and smiles at your memory, then you are truly blessed and lived a life that mattered, but that's just me.