Digging Post Holes Around Noon Time

When I was about five years old, most of the barbed wire fences had already been built by my Dad. However, he still had to build new fences now and then to enclose some areas. Every post put into the ground had to have a hole dug first. This was not done mechanically but by hand using a “drop auger.” It consisted of two blades attached to two pipe handles. One had to drop the blades into the ground, and by spreading the handles apart and squeezing the blades together, extract the dirt out of the hole a little at a time until the hole was deep enough to set the post. Since this tool stood five feet tall and I was only about 4 feet tall, it’s obvious I was too small to operate the drop auger. But my older brother, being tall for his age, could.

On this particular day, George Jr. and Dad were digging postholes in the part of the farm known as the “bottom.” Dad, being a whiz with the auger, could dig about three holes to each one that George Jr. dug. It was getting close to lunchtime and pausing for a while, Dad looked toward the house on the hill and, sure enough, there on the yard fence hung a white cloth. This was a signal Mom used to let us know from afar that lunch was ready! So Dad, setting his digger aside, walked by George Jr. and told him he could come home to eat lunch when he was finished digging his hole.

Well, George was having a little trouble digging this certain hole and it took him another 25 minutes to finish it! When he finally came home for lunch, Dad had already finished eating and was lying down for his usual one-hour nap or “rest period.” Since lunch was already cold, Mom told George to wait a few minutes and she would re-heat it for him.

Well, by the time George finished eating, here comes Dad from his nap. All George Jr. could do was to follow him out of the house and back to the postholes!