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Show HEALTH AND DEATH Chapter XVIII Healthy conditions-Father could rightfully claim that much for Nada. He and the rest of us were hale and hearty. That was partly because most of the settlers were young or less than middle aged, and our isolation shielded us from waves of flu or similar diseases. Also nobody drank or indulged in drugs and our foods were simple and coarse. Few overate! Grandfather Culmsee's death in 1917 was a rarity. He died of a stroke one late spring night soon after he made "final proof" on his homestead. So he departed leaving his half-section to Father. This seemed fitting because Father had paid for most of the improvements required by law to gain ownership. I received the shock of finding Grandfather dead in his bed when I brought his breakfast tray over to his little green house that morning. Father took my news silently as a grave problem he must face. He washed his father and dressed him in the best suit the old gentleman owned. He bought a coffin in Milford and hired a man to haul it to Nada. He dug a grave across the track in a triangle of land that had been part of Grandfather's homestead. Father said that this triangle, well-drained and facing toward the west, was now Nada's cemetery. A sorry sort of pride came to me to know that Nada had another evidence of an established town. But I felt ashamed when I recalled how often I had resented the three-times-a-day task of carrying his meal tray to him in his last year. He preferred to eat in his own house rather than with us, for he was beginning to walk unsteadily and he was stone deaf. I appreciated more now the two sleds he made for me, one with runners and one a toboggan. That one he contrived cleverly by cutting a big wooden cheese box through the middle. Half of it he nailed under one end of a 1x12 inch board so that the toboggan had a |
