|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
A one-century perspective from Roland Greene
by John Klar
I have been very blessed to know dozens of “old-time” Vermont farmers over my lifetime. As I have come to know 97-year-old Roland Greene of Craftsbury, Vermont, I felt his was a voice from the past that could still be heeded today. A former dairy farmer who can relate first-hand what life was like in Vermont during the Great Depression, old hands like Roland offer wisdom in short supply in modern times, but needed more than ever!
Earlier this year, when he was still a young 96, I asked Roland to share some of the stories of his early life. He does so in the audio attached to today’s Substack. Roland talks of milking cows by hand (the herd split between family members — a common tale from those times), feeding dead calves to chickens, working with draft horses, and his dad’s “privileged” wage of 25 cents an hour. Americans may someday soon wish they had listened better to their forebears. I am honored to have captured Roland’s story, albeit briefly and with background noise, while he is still here to share it.
The author is a Brookfield best-selling author, lawyer, farmer and pastor.
Discover more from Vermont Daily Chronicle
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Categories: Commentary
A Vermonter for sure …………………………………………….
I really enjoyed listening to Roland Greene! I’ve been trying to spend less time on line and more time outdoors; luckily there are always chores to do, although nothing as much fun as berry-picking (just stacked two cords of wood). The Amish down the route mow the hay with horses and put it in what I guess are windrows and then hay mows, so they will keep some of these traditions alive, as I try to keep the memory of New England alive in my poetry. Mr. Greene would be about the same age as my childhood milkman, who milked the cows, processed the milk, and then drove his truck to your house and delivered it. If you left the door unlocked, he would put the bottles in your refrigerator. He owned the last dairy farm in Groveland, Massachusetts, and inspired a very long poem. The happiest man I’ve ever met, although he didn’t live to be very old. He showed me a Christmas Day calf and let me name her. Poem and farm pictures here: https://ellingreeranderson.com/bittersweet.html