My Grandparents Were RICH!

Appropriate for All Ages

By Ed J Horton
http://www.edjhorton.com

My grandparents were rich and yet they were the poorest people I ever knew! They were not rich with money or possessions. They didn’t have a big house, new cars, trendy clothes, or lots of toys. They were rich in love and sharing it with others.

My favorite memories of my childhood in the 1950’s and 60’s are of visiting my maternal grandparents—Horace and Sophia Pipher. They were married for over sixty-five years, had eleven children (only six of which lived to reach adulthood), twenty-eight grandchildren, and more great-grandchildren than they could have imagined.

Grandpa had purchased a few acres of wooded land on a hillside (sorta like Pooh Bear’s 100-acre woods) in a small Upstate New York country town. He cleared a small plot of land where he built a house--or as my Dad once called it, a shack. As a kid I thought staying at my grandparents’ was pure paradise! I was probably 5 or 6 years old when I helped Grandpa drive nails into the floor boards of what started as a one-room house. Man, that wood floor squeaked! Eventually, he added 3 more rooms and a small indoor bathroom. But to start with there was an outhouse up a short walking path from the house.

Do you know what an outhouse is? It’s an outside bathroom. There was no running water with which to flush or wash hands, just a wooden bench with a hole over a pit—the toilet. You had to remember to take a roll of toilet paper out with you or you risked looking for leaves off the nearest bush!

As a matter of fact, Grandpa’s house did not have any electricity or running water. Until electricity was installed a couple of years later, Grandpa and Grandma used kerosene lanterns and candles for light. Their source of heat was a wood burning stove and it was also what Grandma used for cooking. Grandpa loved making pancakes and, once the electricity was in, watching “Captain Kangaroo” on television with his grandkids. Captain Kangaroo was the “Mr. Rodgers” of the early days of TV.

For water, Grandpa had an old sink in the one-room kitchen/living room/bedroom but the faucets did not work. Instead Grandpa ran a rubber hose from a creek, which ran alongside the house, and pulled it into a window where it dripped into an old metal bucket that sat in the sink. Grandpa had one of the first home water-filtration systems. He clamped an old rag over each end of the hose to keep out any large chunks of debris! During dry summers when the water level in the creek was low, they had to get water from another source. The grandkids piled into the back of the pickup truck and we drove down to the local church which had a well with a hand pump. We pumped water into 5 gallon milk cans. When we needed water in the house, we took the bucket outside and filled it with water from the milk cans. The running part of the running water was their grandchildren dashing back and forth for buckets of water. They eventually had real running water when they had a well dug, although even then there was no hot water, or even a bathtub or shower in the bathroom. We took turns taking “spit” baths with a large basin of water and a hard bar of soap. No baths—every kid’s dream!

One of the coolest things at my grandparent’s was the creek which ran alongside their acreage and wound around in front of the house. A hot summer day was a perfect time to find a swimming hole and cool off before hunting for minnows, tadpoles, and rocks. From the road above the creek, there was a narrow dirt path that led down to a bridge. Grandpa had built the rickety walking bridge which crossed the creek and led up to the house. Eventually, tired of the short hike, one of my uncles built a sturdier single-lane bridge, strong enough to bear the weight of a car or small truck.

From my grandfather, I learned to drive a stick-shift pickup truck (but not very well, I tended to stall it on railroad tracks), milk a cow, and maintain my balance while on a rolling milk can. Grandpa had built a small rustic barn that housed a few animals to provide food. The cow was their source of milk and for my grandmother to make homemade butter using something called a churn. I tried it once and it was a lot of work just to make a small square of butter. The grandkids cranked an old-fashioned ice cream freezer for a special treat—homemade ice cream! Grandma also made her own bread. There was no modern-day bread making machine. They always had chickens so we collected the eggs each day. Grandpa raised a cow and pig that would eventually be used to provide meat.

Grandpa and Grandma were always sharing what they had with others—whether it was a simple meal that included 10 additional mouths, guests dropping in for an overnight stay, or going miles out of their way to pick up or deliver something for a neighbor or friend. Even when I thought it was inconvenient, my grandparents never complained about helping someone else. It was the way they lived each and every day!

In my mind I can still see my grandparents saying grace before a meal and kneeling by their bed at night to pray. They were rich because they were content with what they had and they always believed they had enough to share with others. I don’t think for a minute that they ever thought of themselves as poor because they were always seeing the blessings of God, even in the tough times.

May you, too, be blessed with rich grandparents!

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Ed J. Horton is enthusiastic when it comes to Sharing Awesome Christian Writings with kids of all ages!Ed lives with his wonderful wife, Susan, and seven-year-old daughter, Deanna, in Boise, Idaho where they share their home with a lazy, long-haired cat named Denny and a lively kitten named Scampy. Ed loves kids and loves sharing in a high-action adventure or an exciting mystery! He enjoys participating in the children's ministry of his church and serves on the board of directors for the pre-school academy.Ed's stories have been published in Christian periodicals such as Seek, Evangel, Purpose, The Vision, Church of God Evangel, Alive!, Keys for Kids, and The Upper Room. His writing appears in The One Year Book of Devotions for Kids #3, God's Vitamin "C" for the Spirit of Men, and in various other inspirational books. For more stories and information Ed, please his website http://www.edjhorton.com.