The following message by Fred Reid is pretty self-explanatory. He sent it to the comment section titled “Old Barns, What? Again”. Many time the comments don’t get read so I have relegated it to a new post. Nice message and it is great to see long forgotten memories aroused by a simple message about barns. The following is Fred’s message.
Richard, I told you that I had decided on the barn that I would call my own and tell others about. I had never really thought of anything special about barns untill you brought the subject up and were able to gather so many real stories that were touching. Well, here is mine.
I went to Falcon, KY in the summer of 1938 to live with my Grandmother Reid; my Grandfather Reid had passed away earlier and she had moved to a small farm they owned. I had lived in Williamson, WV and this trip to a farm was a new venture indeed. All things were new there but I was among relatives and the land where my Father had grown up. I was able to attend the small one room school that he had attended. Sure enough there on one of the desks were his initials carved into the wood, they would have been put there around 1915.
But the best of interesting items I found was the “little wooden barn” located across the creek that divided the farm. It was of lumber construction and tiny in all aspects. The feed room, corn stock room, and tack room were just that, small. And down at the end of the stable was a pen to keep an animal up in. In this case it was a small horse and I was told that it was a sorrel and belonged to our cousin, Doctor Connley. I could only go to the stall when the man who took care of the horse would come and feed, etc. I the got to take the horse to the creek for water and this was my proud thing for the day, plus I could talk and learn farm language from this man. He was a Connley and also a cousin.
The purpose of the horse was to provide transportation for Doctor Connley when he had to go back into the mountains and treat people who were ill. By far the major part of his calls were for childbirth and there is no way of knowing just how many children he delivered; then there were the cancer and tuberculous cases. Doctor Connley would saddle up and hit the old mountain road and ride to the patients home, then maybe sleep a little and then begin his trip to the next patient or else back to the little barn.
The horse knew the way and Doctor Connley would set in the saddle and sleep all the way to the barn and then he would put the horse away. Then he would mount up in his black A Model Ford coupe and drive home to Salyersville.
I have never thought much of that little horse or the barn untill some of the stories about barns have been published. And now, today, I am so glad that I was able to work in that barn, caring for the barn, and feed and watering the horse. I now realize how important that horse was to the patients and to Doctor Connley, as he was carried across the many miles of snow and rain. Looking back, I wouldn’t change a day of it.
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