My Grandparents were married in 1927. My Grandfather was 23 and my Grandmother was 15. My Grandmother had holes in the soles of her shoes the size of fifty cent pieces that day. My Grandmothers Mother had died from a fall down the stairs when she was pregnant, my Grandma was just fifteen months old. She went to live with her fathers sisters family. She lived with them working in the fields and helping to care for babies until she married my Grandfather. She had a very tough life..without a real Mom..always being sent around the family to stay with who ever needed her help the most.
My Grandparents had a number of children in quick succession. A boy in 1928, my Mother in 1929, two more little girls in 1931, and 1933.
In 1934 and 1935, farming was tough with dry years and bad crops. My Grandfather found a way to earn some extra money...MOONSHINE..they built a still in the woods and made their own whiskey. On Saturday nights the customers would show up, my Grandfather would go into the other room and come out with a paper bag. Far Guy's Father was just one of those customers ( He told me on many an occasion "Your Grandpa made REALLY good whiskey.") Apparently it was a booming business, rumor has it that the Moonshine made it all the way from Grandpa's backwoods to Chicago.
Then things turned sour. My Grandmothers Father had remarried. He ordered a mail order bride. The mail order bride blew the whistle and turned in my Grandfather, Grandmother(her step daughter), two of her other new step children and a few neighbors. No one liked her. I have heard her refered to as "That evil woman."
The Dry Agents came and went into the woods behind the barn and brought everything up to the garage. There they cut the copper into small pieces and smashed everything else. The Dry Agents went into the pig barn where the mash was, they poured it out on the ground and the pigs all got drunk. My Mother recalls the pigs and how funny they acted. Only the barrels of mash were put on my Grandparents record, not the whiskey. They had to go to Fergus Falls everyday for two weeks as a part of their sentence.
So to me, a clandestine bakery seems rather fitting on their old farm..:)
The Moonshine Garage
