Staff writer
Crawling under a wagon to get away from the searing heat is one memory 86-year-old J.C. Ehrlich of Marion has of the unforgettable Great Depression of the 1930s.
It was the summer of 1936, and grasshoppers had eaten the leaves off the trees and consumed growing crops.
Ehrlich, 11, and his uncle, Henry Vogel, were laboring in the field one day, trying to salvage bare corn stalks and straw for feed. By mid-afternoon, the temperature had risen to more than 110 degrees.
The sun was so hot, they lay under the farm wagons in an attempt to get away from its merciless glare.
Jackrabbits were plentiful in those days, he said. He remembers going out with his .22-caliber rifle and shooting five or six and hanging them in the chicken barn as protein for the hens.
Sometimes, he said, he cooked jackrabbits and a little grain in a big, black pot of boiling water, then fed them to the hogs.
In winter, he sometimes hunted cottontail rabbits, dressed them, and buried them in the snow. His mother fried the meat the next day. Ehrlich and his younger brother and older sister often took cold rabbit to school in their noon lunches.
Ehrlich grew up fast after his father, Jonathan Ehrlich, died in 1934. J.C. was 10 years old. He turned 11 the day after his father’s funeral.
Thankfully, his father had had an insurance policy, and the proceeds paid off the family’s debts.
Ehrlich helped his mother with the daily milking and the gathering of eggs from their flock of 300 laying hens.
His mother rented the 160-acre farm to his uncle. Ehrlich helped with the fieldwork.
He remembers operating a tractor to pull a combine during wheat harvest.
“I had to scoot as far forward as possible to reach the clutch,” he said, “and I stood up to turn the steering wheel, to turn around at the end of the field.”
Things improved in 1938, when his uncle purchased a Gleaner combine.
The Ehrlich children attended Dobbs Country School, now sits on the campus of Emporia State University. J.C. graduated from eighth grade in 1937. His sister graduated a year later, and the two of them entered Marion High School that fall.
Ehrlich drove a 1931 Chevrolet four-door sedan. He purchased 8½ gallons of gasoline for $1. It lasted more than a week.
Ehrlich took over the farm in 1940 and put out his first wheat crop while still in high school. He bought a Twin City J tractor with steel wheels and a crank starter. It pulled a two-bottom plow.
“I bought the tractor new, but it never did perform well,” he said.
Four years later, he bought a Farmall M with rubber tires, a starter, and lights. It could pull a three-bottom plow. It was quite an improvement, he said.
Ehrlich exchanged a dairy cowherd for stock cows and bought a parcel of grass southeast of Lincolnville. He eventually acquired a 40-head cowherd.
“My cowherd bought my land,” he said, “and my grain bought a few pieces of equipment.”
At age 30, Ehrlich met Florence Hefley of Hillsboro. He had first seen her at the Rock Island Depot in Marion, and connected with her after his sister learned her name.
“The first time I saw you, I couldn’t get my eyes off of you,” Florence had said.
“You liked my overalls,” J.C. had replied.
Florence was working at Groening Motor Co. in Hillsboro at the time. One day, Ehrlich met her there and offered to drive her home. That was the beginning of an 18-month courtship. They were married Sept. 4, 1954. He was 31. She was 27.
Florence was working at the U.S. Agricultural Service Center in Marion, but quit after three months of marriage in order to provide for her husband’s needs.
“I came home at noon, and I needed something to eat,” he said.
They built a new house on the farm the next year.
The couple had three children: Janet, Daryl, and Carol.
Their life underwent a big change in 1966, when they were forced to move for construction of Marion Reservoir.
Ehrlich said it all started in 1941, after heavy rain flooded downtown Marion. Several Marion businessmen went to Washington, D.C. to ask for a dam to control the flow of water from the Cottonwood River, he said.
The 1951 flood boosted the demand, and eventually the reservoir was approved. Work began in the early 1960s, and the dam was finished in 1969.
The Ehrlichs sold 40 acres to the government and moved their house, two barns, and a granary one-quarter mile north. They built corrals and dug two wells.
Ehrlich remembers the emotions he and others experienced concerning the reservoir.
“I wasn’t for it,” he said. “I was losing some ground. But I came out all right. The government paid for moving the farm, and I bought 160 acres with the money I got for the 40.
“It broke up farms and families, but most probably came out ahead.”
Ehrlich harvested his last wheat crop in 2002 at age 79.
“My equipment was not too good anymore, and we wanted to do some traveling,” he said.
The couple made five trips to Europe, where their oldest daughter, Janet Priddy, and her family, live on a U.S. air base in Germany. They also often visited their daughter, Carol Stevens, and her husband, in Red Bluff, Ca.
Florence Ehrlich moved to St. Luke Living Center in October. Ehrlich visits her two or three times a week.
“I suppose it won’t be too long before I’ll be there,” he said.
For now, he keeps house and does yard work, including taking care of a garden.
“I didn’t realize how much work it is to take care of a house,” he said.
Ehrlich takes advantage of his farm’s location at the entrance to Cottonwood Point on Pawnee Road. Campers can park RVs on his property for a daily fee. He also sells firewood and produce from his garden.
Ehrlich lived 43 years on the original homestead, and has lived 43 years on the new homestead.
“I was born on the same piece of ground and I hope to die here,” he said. “I told my family I wanted to be cremated and my ashes sprinkled up here on the hill, but they won’t have it.”