Person:Martha Lange (1)

By Martha, December 1985: The Lange family lived in Veile (Vejle), Denmark. Two eldest sons, Marious and James, emmigrated to New York where they apprenticed to carpenters. After they were settled the two oldest girls, Kristena and Julena, followed and worked as chamber maids. kristena met a Dane, Andrew Sorensen, who was just out of the Army, and married him. When he was 18 years old Louis Ludwig, my father, came over by ship, 21 days trip steerage and everyone sea sick. He was also apprenticed to carpenters. His first job was making rough boxes for undertakers. A couple of years later Father Julious Theodore Lange and wif Anna Marie and two daughters, Anna and Terese, followed. The boys must have located land in Nebraska before the parents came as they all had land near Callaway, Nebraska. Louis (my dad) took a pack horse and saddle horse and set out to see the country. He told of being desperate for a job and he just arrived at a cotton hoeing farm as the owner was firing his overseer. So, dad took the job. He thought he would be a better boss, so he grabbed a hoe and started. Teh negroes would hoe fast and be at the other end before he could get started. So they would dance and sing until was almost there and start back. he said he gave up in half a day, he was so tired. He said he could see why the bosses were slave drivers as the negroes were so smart. More so than the drivers. He sold all but his saddle horse and went back to Nebraska. The Robertson family lived in a coal mining part of Scotland. The family must have all come to Grand Island, Illinois, a coal mining district. part of them homesteaded in nebraska near Callaway. My parents moved into a two room sod house on a ranch and raised cattle and pigs. Their fist child (Richard) died of whooping cough. I was born in the sode house (I remember it clearly today, the sod house, not my birth). We lived in it until I was 6 or 7 years old. The ranch had a creek winding across the flat part where the buildings were. We crosses it twice to get to the main road. It ran flood stage fall and spring but was small and dry in summer. The hills were where the cows grazed. The pig pen was an acre of creek and flat fenced in. They would rub against the wild plum trees in the fall and as they fell pigs would come running from all over to feast on the fruit. The creek banks were full of fruit, wild plum, grape, choke cherry, pin cherry, currant (red, y ellow and black) gooseberry and Buffalo berry, as I remember them. There were rattlesnakes and bullsnakes. Mother tells of having a window open and finding a bullsnake half the size of her arm, lying along the ledge of the wall in the bedroom. People didn't mind having them about as no rattlers were near a bull snake and they were good mouse catchers. When I was 4 1/2 I started school. Dad took me over the creek and showed me a path. I had to duck under bushes to get over. It was a hort cut. On the way to school I had to pass a prairie dog town. I was fascinated with them. I wonder if I wasn't late sometimes as I remember watching them. I told Dad I saw an owl come out of a hole. He laughed at me. But now I read in Natural Geographics where that is so. The small owl lives in abandoned prairie dog holes. Most of the school children were cousin Langes, at our "Cottonwood School", I believe it was called. I was in fourth grade when we left in March of 1909. My sister Marie was born June 2, 1905. She was premature and weighed 2.5 pounds. Mother told of using a large cigar box (balsa wood) padded with cotton batten for a bed. She was not washed in water but sponged with oil and no clothes at first. The box was put in a big rocker wiled with quilts and blankets. What is strange to me: How did she survive? When people came for miles to see her (no charge) a silver dollar hid her face and Mother's wedding ring went on her arm to her shoulder. Fed with Mother's milk with an eye dropper. Both her arms were out of the sockets from handling her. Today they don't survive as well in all the new inventions. She is 80 years old this year. I remember once Mother was away with the baby for a few days and I stayed home with Dad. I sat on the humpback trunk looking out the window beside the sewing machine. I spotted the scissors and cut a big chunk out of my hair. Mother wasn't happy but I hated long hair as my head was tender to braid the stuff and Mother wasn't careful. I remember waking up on November 22nd, 1907. I was in bed with Marie and when she woke up she said "Sissy there is a little pig in the house". I had been listening and knew it was a new baby sister, Rachel. Aunt Kristena came and told me to get up and get ready for school and Uncle Marious would take me. When I tried to get past the Doctor at the end of the table I tripped over his black bag. I worried all day I might have hurt some of the babies he had in it. I remember Mother and Dad making me get into the potato pit in the back of the cellar to get potatoes. It was crawling with lizards (Newts). To this day I can't stand the sight of them. I think we mus thave moved into a frame house in 1908 sometime. In 1910 early Spring Dad took the train to Macleod, Alberta, to look for a new location as the doctor said Mom should have a change. She weighed 90 pounds. She left Marie and me in bed when she took Dad to the station 8 miles and told me to stay there until she got back. Which I did and Marie didn't waken. One night in 1919, probably while Dad was gone, Mom had forgotten to get in water. She sent me to the windmill to get a little pailful. I didn't want to go, so she stood in the door with a lamp but when the phone range she told me to go on and she would set the lamp on the window sill while she answered it. It was bright starlight and i stood looking up at a bright star with a long tail. When I heard Mom say "You mean if that tail touches the earth the world will end". I grabbed my pail and ran for the house. That was Halley's Comet. Dad got to Macleod in the middle of the night, so went to the hotel. At breakfast he looked at the menu but told the waitress he wanted Mush. She said, "Yes sir, porridge" and he said, "No, I want Mush." He was sure those Canadians didn't know much if they didn't know what mush was. She brought him oatmeal anyway. Mother's Uncle Richy took Dad to Burdett district to look for land as that part was open for homesteading. They drove down with horses and wagon. Dad didn't pick any one place, but decided to settle there. The sale was March 21st, I believe, and we visited relatives around until we could leave. Uncle Jim Lange bought our place and Vera lived there when she was married. I was back in Nebraska twice, but never saw the place again after we left. Mother and us 3 kids went by train to Macleod. Dad took a railroad car of settler's effects. He had 4 horses and they tried to quarantine them at the line. But he and others found out the agents had a scam going. They could sell the horses after they were supposed to have killed them and they made you pay to have them destroyed and buried. So Dad got a bet of his own and was able to get them into Canada. Mother and we kids went ot St. Paul, Minnesota, and when we got to the Canadian Pacific Railroad in Saskatchewan, we were put on an immigrant car. The seats just had slats and there was a stove at the end of the car where you could heat food. You had to have your own blankets or coats, whatever. We had food with us for the three day trip. The train did not stop for meals or anything. The immigrants from overseas had lots of blankets but Mother kept ours away from theirs as they were crawling with cooties. After all they had been on a boat or train for a month or more. At Macleod, Uncle had moved to the west side of this homestead as when the survey was made, the road was on the west line. The Indian Reservation was South of their place and Macleod was 4 or 5 miles North. One day, I remember, we kids, Nellie, John and I, were playing in the yard when we saw the Indian wagons coming, 5 wagons, 1 hayrack, lots of horses and dogs. John ran to tell Aunt Mary. By that time they were even with the house and the dogs took after the chickens and the kids ran after the dogs, whooping. Aunt Mary ran screaming after them but the dogs grabbed two chickens and th ekids took them and rung the necks. Never stopping, they ran for the wagons, the Indians whooping and hollering, whipoped up the horses and went on their way. They said every spring the Indians went like that bag and baggage to the river. They camped and fished. The women filleted and smoked the fish and then they went back. They did the same in berry time and they were theives as well. I saw and rode in my first car, a Ford, while we were there. Some agents came and he and Uncle had to go over to the old homestead for something so took us kids. They had the tallest swing I ever saw up to then, telephone poles. I thought it grand as we pump ourselves up so high. Nellie and I were such great pals but hard time etc., I never saw her again after we went to Burdett. Uncle Richie had a tractor the older boys, George and Donald, ran. Uncle was very impatient and would say "Get the clothes off your hands". Of course, if you drove a tractor you had to have a fancy pair of leather gloves. Dad came for us and we went ot Burdett. We spent the first few nights in the restaurant a widow lady ran, just across from the depot. Then we moved into a shack south of the tracks. It was a long building Dad put up. Horses and chickens were in one end of it and our household goods next and we lived in the rest. no floor. I tturned cold (end of April) and Dad found a chunk of coal on the railroad track so put it in the stove to hold fire overnight. In the morning the stove was a mess. it was steam coal and just melted and ran all over the grates. Another dumb Yankee trick. Dad drove us all over to look for a location. Some of th eplaces south of Burdett had grass as high as my 9 year old head. When we moved Dad just took the building apart in sections and set them up on the farm. He cut off part for a barn and chickens. So we had a house. The roof was just tarpaper and the wind was hard on it so it rained inside when it rained. Dad put Binder cnavases up over us kids' bunk beds and they sloped to the center between their bed on the other side so the water ran on the ground an dyou stepped in ankle deep water when you got out of bed. We lived in this from July 1st into the fall. Dad started to build a cottage roof house. Mother worked on it also. So I remember it as a wonderful time. I had to take care of the two other kids. But we could explore, not too far. There was a large rock half out of the ground which was very fascinating to us who had no rocks or even pebbles in nebraska. We found small stones so pretty but Mother wouldn't let us in the house with them. So we had caches near the large rock and I valued those treasures for years. The prairies were so different then. Dad cut hay that fall and it was spear grass. He wore heavy underwear and socks and had to pick the spears out of them. There were lots of flowers. They showed up so plain in the bleached grass. Dad took the wagon and team and Marie and me, and we picked up a wagon box of cow chips. They made a quick hot fire and were fuel for summer and to start the coal in winter. There was a coal min 3 miles from home. There was no schoool that first summer but the county was settling fast, so the men got together and held meetings and formed a school district and built a school. The government wanted names for the school and Mother sent in Morning Star, which they chose. So I went to school again. I missed a lot of school as I was always needed to herd cows or what ever was needed. I didn't even take grade 8 exams. But the winter of 1916-17 I went to Agricultural College in Claresholm, Alberta, for just the one 6 month term. The Alberta Government built three Agricultural Colleges in 1915. One in each of Lacomb, Wainright and Claresholm. Mother took me up to find accomodation, on the train we met Leah and Bob Burns and Bob Clark from Burdett, who were going to College, too. Leah and I roomed together in a house run by an English nannie. She had four bedrooms, two girls each and she slept on a mattress on the kitchen floor. I think we paid $17.50 each for room and board per month. She said no boy friends but if we had an odd cousin that would be fine. As it was, she was the one who found a boyfriend. She was 29 years old, I think. Leah and I were friends for years. We wrote once or twice a year until 1984 when she died. I didn't get to go back to College the next year to graduate, as 1917 was a bad crop year again. We all had the Flu in 1918. I had all the family - Mother, Dad, Marie, Rachel, Veile and Ted - all in bed and could make mustard plasters in my sleep. The hired man John did chores outside and helped all he could. But one morning he did chores and then came in and went to bed, and he had the fever so I went and told Mother and she said I should put mustard plasters on him, but I didn't want to, so she got up and helped me. Dad had been up an hour or so at a time for a couple of days before, so he took over the chores. The next morning I went to bed. So Mother and Dad took over. Rachel had been feeling better, so she sat behind the heater the next morning while Dad brought in the coal and that evening she had a bad spell. She was choking and Dad had her in his arms walking up and down and tryhing every way to keep her breathing. Mother ran to the coal oil can and poured some into a cup and tried to put it in Rachel's mouth. Dad said, "Leave her be, she is dying", but Mother got some into her mouth and in a second Rachel gasped and heaved up a chunk of phlegm and started to cry. I remember i was in bed and I prayed so hard. I couldn't imagine our family without her. She got well fast after that. Veile and Ted were in bed together and Mother asked what they wanted for lunch. Ted said "Chicken soup" and Veile punched him in the nose and said "Oh, you old hen". His nose bled and bled and he got well fast after that. Veile wasn't as lucky. The night after I took sick, the Brown Brothers and the Minister from Burdett drove into our place. They had been visiting homes every night after work and the tragedy they told, some places whole families were down for days before they found them and sometimes dead or dying and all in the same bed. Teh Browns came every night after that and brought medicine. The sound of that car coming was sure a nice sound as no one else came. People were dying like flies and hardly a family who didn't lose some member. One of the Brown Brothers lived in Burdett and turned his hotel into a hospital. Those two brothers should have had medals for the good they did at that time. The fall of 1920 I got a trip to Nebraska to visit relatives. I left from Lethbridge via Great Falls, Billings and into Broken Bow, Nebraska, 3 days and 2 nights, no sleeping car for me. I spent 4 months there and spent a few days with each family mostly aunts and uncles. After I came home and spring work was over, i got a job for a Dr. Rose's wife in Taber. I was supposed to just take care of 2 little girls but of course when they find out you can do, the more you get to do. I worked there the month of July, but the rodeo was on so Harry came up and we went and got married in the Anglican Church with just two strangers for witness. That was July 26, 1921. I finished out the month, then stayed at Marble and Ed Johnson's where Harry waws working that fall, until their harvest was over, about a month, as crops were very short and the crop was headed and stacked and then thrashed. We then rented a farm north of Burdett from Leanard Webb and moved in. So we started married life which lasted 47 years. Perhaps I should say my Mother and I didn't see eye to eye and the only way I could see out was to get out and work. So when I married she didn't speak to me for 8 years. Then she never mentioned it nor did I so we got along that way. If I had been wiser or smarter I perhaps would have done different. I was 19 years old but very naive as I wasn't allowed out of Mother's sight often. And I was cheap labor. When I complained about any job she always said "What do you think I raised you for?"" I lived to be glad she was so hard on me as I don't think I could have survived some of the things I had to live through otherwise. You learn to survive. Vira was born May 18, 1922. We had rented another place in that spring so we could grow wheat and a graden as the Webb place was planted to rye. Granny Phipps stayed with me 10 days and we had a doctor from Burdett for the night she was born. In the next spring we moved to the Berlin Farm, which was 3 miles from Dad's place. We worked hard that year both of us. I room and boarded old Barney Berlin and in the fall he beat us out of everything as we didn't have a written contract. So much for ignorance. I moved into an empty place, Peterson's, and it was near Marble and Ed Johnsons' and Granny. At first I had a 10 years old girl with me but she wouldn't go to schoool so I took her home again and Vira and I lived alone. Dad brought a horse and buggy over and gave them to me so I could get around as we had to sell everything except one milk cow in order to live that winter. Harry went to British columbia to get a job and ended up at Leona (Montana I think) where he drove six horses on logging haul all winter. My sisters and brother used to sneek over to my house every chance they had to play with the baby. I hated to have them do it, but I had tried to make friends with Mother but no dice, so. Marie was teaching school in Lethbridge that winter and once when sh ewas home she drove over to myh place and brought Mother. Even though we all had lunch she wouldn't talk or look at the baby. Vira was 1 1/2 by then. In the spring Harry came home and packed us up and took a settler's effects Railway Car loaded to Creston. Vira and I came to Creston on the train after Harry. We lived in an old house for a week until he oculd rent a place in Lister, 20 acres, one 5 acres in orchard, 5 acres slashed and grass seed sprinkled and the back 10 acres in brush. These farms were what the British Columbian government had to settle Veterans of the Great War. Some moved out after a few months and some stayed. Later the Government settled the place with immigrants from Germany and other European countries. Harry found work at Creston Sawmills and later driving 4 horse teams hauling logs from Arrow Creek. He boarded with Mrs. Bickum, 8 or so men slept on mattresses on the floor in a back room and she fed them. They suffered the sleeping arrangement because she was a good cook and gave them plenty, plain food. Harry came to Lister for Sunday and back to work on Sunday night. He worked 6 days a week. I don't remember his wages. In the late fall of 1924 Harry came home to live and went to work for Huscroft Mill in Lister. He rode horseback and stayed a home. Marble was born January 10, 1925, and Granny Phipps came out on the train to be with me. We intended to have a doctor there but there was a bad storm on that night and the roads were all blocked but we didn't need him. Dr. Henderson had to sign the birth registry but he never saw the baby. The storm put down trees and killed lots of fruit trees in the valley. The mailman walked on logs across the Forestry road west to the K.V. road now Highway 21 and someone met him at the road and by the evening the road was open so someone drove him out to Lister. They had telephones so he could call home. In March Harry was on the move again. He wanted to go to the Peace River Country but loaded up a box car and went to Edmonton. His sister and brother-in-law lived in South Edmonton. I and my two babies took the train back to Grassy Lake to Marble Johnson's to wait until he had settled somewhere. He was met in Edmonton by Bert Barager (his brother-in-law) and he talked Harry into ging to Telfordville County as he had heard great things about it. Daisy Barager wrote me to come and stay with her. I arrived and the next day Louise's boyfriend visiting her heard of their plans and told the men that he had cousins out in that part, name of McDonnell. Bert thought he could find his way around but Harry asked a lot of questions and they drove to Telfordville. They each picked out a place and when they got back to Edmonton and went to file on the land for homesteads, Bert said he had decided he wanted the place Harry had picked and Harry could have th eone he picked. Harry let him file for after all we were staying at their place. Harry had also found a place he could rent to live in out there. So as soon as we could we moved out, to a small shack, one room but a shed on the side we made into a bedroom. It was settled at one time but the owner moved and rented. When school was out Bert sent out 6 or 8 milk cows, ducks, geese and kids. We had to put beds on the floor all over. Four kids Bertie 14, Bernard 12, Billy and Vivian, Maud and her girlfriend came for a week. Then Bert expected Harry to build a house on his land, he sent out lumber and the McDonnell Boys, Rod and Bill, helped an dput up a shack, just tar paper for roof and Bert moved Daisy out just before school started. When it rained the roof leaked so Daisy had a terrible time. Harry had a job on the road, working with 4 horse team on scraper for Municipality. He had to keep us eating as Bert told the kids they were to milk the cows and ship the cream. He was supposed to pay some of the expenses but didn't. When it came Christmas time he rented a house in Leduc and Harry had to move the whole outfit back to Leduc and out again in the spring. Bert was nasty to us as he expected Harry to quit work an dhelp Daisy (who believed all he told her). When they moved back in the spring Harry showed Bernard how to shingle the house and he and Daisy did it htemselves. Bert worked for the Railroad in Edmonton. Bernard worked real hard on the place and got no thanks from his father, but the boys all loved their Uncle Harry. In November 1929 we sold the Homestead we had lived on and proved up, called a second Preemption. The railroad had just been built from Lacombe to near our Falconer Shcool by the Canadian Pacific Railroad. Harry filled a frieght car with settler's effects and shipped out to Claresholm. Frank Meinche and his wife drove the 4 children to Leduc and I went by train to Claresholm. Here is a version by Lois Phipps Price, received January 1995: Harry Phipps and Martha Lange were married on July 26, 1920. Her parents did not approve of her marriage and did not speak to her again for 7 years. Martha and Harry lived with his sister and family for the first year of their marriage, later moving into a place of their own. Alvira was born while they lived there. In 1924 Harry decided that they should move to Camp Lister, British columbia, so he could have land in a Soldiers Settlement. However, when they arrived the land was only for British Columbia veterans. They lived in a house that a veteran had already abandoned. Dad drove 4 horse teams for a sawmill while they lived there. Marble was born that first winter. Dad left in the Spring of 1925 for Sunnybrook, Alberta, onto another soldiers Settlement. Mother went back to Burdett with her children until he could build a house, and later moved to Sunnybrook. There they lived for 4 years, Mother says the only 4 unhappy years of her life. The land was poor, crops didn't grow. The black flies and the mosquitos were awful (they still are). The land is gumbo so every time the children went out she was hours cleaning off shoes again. Two children were born while they were there, Lois and Raymond. In the fall of 1929 it was time to move again. Mother says dad worked to ge the railroad to come through the Drayton Valley and they got on the first train that left. They moved back to Burdett. Here Martha's parents came to visit and pretended that had never disapproved of Dad at all. I wasnt until these last few years that Mother has told us the story of them not talking or writing to her. Nina was born in Burdett. May 26, 1933, it was moving time again, this time with horses and wagons. Mother driving one and Dad another, they loaded up five children, two cows and a dog and set off for Creston, British Columbia. One cow was sold for some ready cash, the dog ran off near the end of the trip, but the rest arrived safely. Although we never did have much money, Creston is a wonderful place to grow up. Fruit is plentiful, you can grow any vegetables that you need. Winters are mild and not too long. Mother was a good seamstress so we were always as well clothed as our neighbors. When I wanted to take Teachers training somehow the money was found for a year in Victoria, and hwen Nina wanted Secretarial Training the money was found for her to have a year in Calgary. All of our children have fond memories of Grandma and Grandpa on the far. Mother stayed on the farm until Ray and his family were murdered and then she moved into Creston. She had her own apartment and in later years moved in with Nina. Last February she went into a Nursing Home. She still enjoys life very much. She has been such a help to me in getting this history started and is interested in all the many relatives I have me in the process. Henry: Harry was apprenticed to a blacksmith at the age of eight.