build an extension to the barn, and together they installed an indoor toilet and bathtub. Stureâs father and mother lived in a constant amazement at their son, and at the same time worried about him. He didnât seem to smile as much. He didnât talk with the animals any more. All he did was read books.
He wanted them to buy a tractor. He mailed away and got catalogues of tractors, showing them to his mother and father, trying to explain the work they could do with one, how the farm would prosper. But there wasnât enough money for that, and their simple, saving Swedish minds couldnât allow for borrowing any more money; already the mortgage payments were hard enough to make.
There were no girls in Stureâs life. He didnât go to any of the social events at school, partly because he was too young, too small; but mostly because in his experience the unpredictability of girls made them unpleasant to him. Sture liked things to proceed with some understandable logic and direction. He could understand most things, but the things he could not understand he avoided. He tried to avoid illness, art, music, and girls. This was another weakness of Stureâs. He valued consistency and predictability far more than change and chance.
His greatest interest was still in machinery of any kind. Man designed machines, therefore they were understandable by another man. It was like mathematics. If he took his time and paid careful attention, he felt he could understand any machine or any equation that someone else could invent. He also felt he could invent either machines or mathematics.
He invented many machines; one was a machine for washing clothes. It was run by his windmill and turned paddles back and forth in a large tub. The problem was he could never get his mother to use it; she was afraid of it, or any machine. Sture became the one who washed clothes on the farm. He was also working on a mechanical system for milking cows. He was trying to do it with vacuum pumps, also run by his windmill, but couldnât get the pressure valves regulated and the milk kept running up into his vacuum lines instead of out and into the milk pail.
He managed to build a small crystal radio set with which they could hear music from Oshkosh. This was a machine his mother did like. For her it was what reading was to Sture, a way to go away without leaving the farm.
When World War I started, Sture took a great interest in its progress. This horrendous conflict between men, in which thousands were dying, seemed incredibly illogical to him. He could not conceive of any other animal participating in such a crazy orgy of killing, maiming, and destruction. He would buy the daily newspaper in Manawa every day and pedal home with it quickly. It became part of his reading program. There was hardly a book in the high school and public library there he had not read, so the newspaper filled a gap in his reading time and a gap in his worldly knowledge.
In 1917, Sture was twenty-one years old and one of the first in his area to be drafted into the army. He had mixed feelings. He hated leaving the farm in the hands of his, to him, aging parents. They were at this time sixty years old. He also did not want to be killed.
But the chance to travel, to see what the rest of the world was really like, and to find for himself the nature of this seeming carnage going on in Europe, had its fascination. When Sture boarded the train going to training camp in Fort Benning, Georgia, he still had not been any farther from home than Oshkosh and he still hadnât kissed a girl, or even held hands with one.
His parents kissed him tearfully goodbye and assured him they would keep the farm in good order while he was away. They were frightened for him, at the same time proud. It was part of his being a real American, going away to fight for his country.
PART 3
T he way they let us out at our school is exactly as if they were letting us out of some
He wanted them to buy a tractor. He mailed away and got catalogues of tractors, showing them to his mother and father, trying to explain the work they could do with one, how the farm would prosper. But there wasnât enough money for that, and their simple, saving Swedish minds couldnât allow for borrowing any more money; already the mortgage payments were hard enough to make.
There were no girls in Stureâs life. He didnât go to any of the social events at school, partly because he was too young, too small; but mostly because in his experience the unpredictability of girls made them unpleasant to him. Sture liked things to proceed with some understandable logic and direction. He could understand most things, but the things he could not understand he avoided. He tried to avoid illness, art, music, and girls. This was another weakness of Stureâs. He valued consistency and predictability far more than change and chance.
His greatest interest was still in machinery of any kind. Man designed machines, therefore they were understandable by another man. It was like mathematics. If he took his time and paid careful attention, he felt he could understand any machine or any equation that someone else could invent. He also felt he could invent either machines or mathematics.
He invented many machines; one was a machine for washing clothes. It was run by his windmill and turned paddles back and forth in a large tub. The problem was he could never get his mother to use it; she was afraid of it, or any machine. Sture became the one who washed clothes on the farm. He was also working on a mechanical system for milking cows. He was trying to do it with vacuum pumps, also run by his windmill, but couldnât get the pressure valves regulated and the milk kept running up into his vacuum lines instead of out and into the milk pail.
He managed to build a small crystal radio set with which they could hear music from Oshkosh. This was a machine his mother did like. For her it was what reading was to Sture, a way to go away without leaving the farm.
When World War I started, Sture took a great interest in its progress. This horrendous conflict between men, in which thousands were dying, seemed incredibly illogical to him. He could not conceive of any other animal participating in such a crazy orgy of killing, maiming, and destruction. He would buy the daily newspaper in Manawa every day and pedal home with it quickly. It became part of his reading program. There was hardly a book in the high school and public library there he had not read, so the newspaper filled a gap in his reading time and a gap in his worldly knowledge.
In 1917, Sture was twenty-one years old and one of the first in his area to be drafted into the army. He had mixed feelings. He hated leaving the farm in the hands of his, to him, aging parents. They were at this time sixty years old. He also did not want to be killed.
But the chance to travel, to see what the rest of the world was really like, and to find for himself the nature of this seeming carnage going on in Europe, had its fascination. When Sture boarded the train going to training camp in Fort Benning, Georgia, he still had not been any farther from home than Oshkosh and he still hadnât kissed a girl, or even held hands with one.
His parents kissed him tearfully goodbye and assured him they would keep the farm in good order while he was away. They were frightened for him, at the same time proud. It was part of his being a real American, going away to fight for his country.
PART 3
T he way they let us out at our school is exactly as if they were letting us out of some
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