CENTURY FARM - Ona Meyer and her son, Jon, accepting their century farm award during the 2021 Freeborn County fair.
By BARB FINSETH
Staff Writer
Ona Meyer lives in the same house today that she was born in just west of Hartland. Her father, Ole Knudson, bought the 200 acres including the building site shortly before he married his wife, Hilda Rugroden of New Richland, on March 16, 1920. Ona and her family were recognized as a Century Family Farm at the 2021 Freeborn County Fair. The commemorative plaque was received a year late because the 2020 Fair was cancelled due to the pandemic.
Ole and Hilda Knutson started out in the best of times. From 1910 to 1920, farm land prices in Minnesota went from $46/acre to $109/acre. Improved farming practices and equipment made it easier to produce more crops and work more land. Crop prices were high and credit was readily available for producers and consumers because high production from farmers was essential for military use in Europe during WWI. In 1918 - 1919, billions of pounds of pork, beef, and dairy products were shipped to Allied countries, various relief programs, and American Expeditionary Forces overseas.
But when the war ended, it quickly turned into the worst of times in the 1920s for the agricultural community locally and nationwide. Demand from Europe for U.S. surplus production was gone and there was a dramatic decrease of 63% in market prices for farm crops. Farmers had more land, equipment, and debt, making it difficult to reduce production. Large surpluses of corn caused prices to drop from $1.30/bushel to 47 cents/bushel in one year.
Ole served in WWI and while overseas he was exposed to toxic gases being used as a weapon against their forces. This exposure affected his lungs and throat for the rest of his life. He had a persistent cough and couldn't eat things that scratched his throat like apple skins or popcorn.
When he returned home in 1919, he purchased the land and building site near Hartland where he and Hilda settled. When things began to turn down economically in the ‘20s, the seller who sold the property to Ole forgave half of the loan on his purchase. They made the agreement that Ole would pay only the interest on the remaining loan until things turned around again for him. Hilda told her daughter, Ona, that, "There were two bills they paid every month no matter how tough things were: the interest payment on the loan and a government life insurance policy."
Ole and Hilda had five children, all born in the farm house. Ona was born in 1929 as the middle child with two older sisters and a younger brother and sister.
While laughing Ona shared how her parents used to jokingly tease her. “They said, ‘When I was born, things really crashed!’
"We kids never knew that we were poor when we were growing up, because everyone was in the same situation," Ona recalled.
The Meyer family farm was like most of the other farms around them. “We had a big garden, work horses (We had four.), cows (including dairy shorthorn), pigs, chickens, and we all had chores to do depending on our ages."
Ona drove the horses for haying, and drove a tractor for cutting the grain while her father sat on the binder. Later, a local farmer would bring his threshing machine to harvest the grain at each farm site with all the farmers helping each farm while the farm women shared the cooking duties to feed everyone. Silo filling with green corn occured the same way.
The children were never taken out of school to work on the farm. They attended a country school not far from their farm until it was destroyed by a "cyclone."
"That's what we called it back then, which would today be called a tornado," Ona said.
Another country school was built on land donated from a local farmer, just south of the Freeborn/Waseca county line on Hwy 13. It closed in the 1940's after Ona finished 8th grade, and she and her siblings then went to Freeborn, where they graduated. Each of them went on to additional schooling, with Ona going to the American Business College for a year in business and secretarial training.
In 1937, Ona's father built a big, new barn with wiring for electricity. The old barn was taken down, so the new barn could be built in the same place. Ona remembers, "The stanchions from the old barn were set up and stabilized outside, and that's where we milked the cows, outside, all summer!" They kept the milk cool by putting the milk cans in large tin tanks filled with cool water. An open shed was built to shelter the horses until the barn was finished.
The Freeborn/Mower County Electric Company was formed in late 1936, and began bringing lines for electricity to many of the local farm sites a year later. Ona remembers the house was to get two outlets for electricity in 1938. The family planned a party for Ona's older sister's birthday in October, when they would use the new electric lighting for the first time. But, the electric company couldn't get it finished in time. "So the company did a temporary connection for that day," Ona tells, "And came back the next day to disconnect it with plans to finish it later. It was so wonderful to turn those lights on for the party! I'm sure that's why I remember so well as to when we got hooked up to the lines."
The family always had a car, and her father always bought Chevys.
"I'm not sure what his first car was, but it may have been the Overland with no top that ended up in a pasture on the farm,” Ona says. “We kids had so much fun playing in it, pretending to drive it!"
Ona met Don Meyer while she was working her first job after business college at Steven's Music Company in Albert Lea. He often came to the store to visit his cousin who also worked there. They married in 1950 and settled in Albert Lea, where they spent the next 26 years raising their six children.
Ole passed away in 1974, and Don and Ona purchased and moved to the eight acre building site of the farm in 1976. Ona's brother, Harold Knudson, and Don purchased and farmed the rest of the acreage together. Hilda eventually bought a house in Hartland, where she lived for many years before moving to St John's in Albert Lea in the early 1990's. Because Hilda's memory was still so sharp when she moved to St John's, Ona's daughter, Cyndi Wenzel, gave her grandmother a notebook and requested that she write down any memories that might come to mind. Hilda did just that until her death in 1996, just one month short of her 102nd birthday. Cyndi typed up these memories in a booklet for family members.
A memorable night for Ona occured Sunday, April 30, 1967, while they were still living in Albert Lea.
"We got a phone call that a tornado had touched down near Hartland,” she said. “When we tried to call my parents, there was no phone service. We rushed to Hartland and could see flashing emergency lights just west out of town, and we began to fear the worst. When we reached the farm, there was no damage at all, not even a tree limb was down. Our farm had been totally missed by the storm."
The tornado was later rated an F4 and was on the ground 90% of the time while it traveled 20 miles from Hartland to Waseca. This day later became known as "Black Sunday" because of the numerous monster tornadoes that hit southern Minnesota that day.
Ona and Don were lifetime members of Grace Lutheran Church in Albert Lea where Ona still continues her membership. For a time Ona worked at Grace Lutheran before joining the administrative staff at Hawthorne Elementary in Albert Lea. When they moved to Hartland, Ona worked at NRHEG elementary and secondary schools before, during, and after the merger with Ellendale-Geneva for over 20 years, retiring in 1998. Don continued to work the farm with their son, Jon, when he purchased the farming acres in 1987. Don also did seasonal farm work with a local farmer for 20 years until he retired in 2014. He passed away in 2017.
Ona is proud and happy still to be able to live at the family farm site today with its 100 years of history.
She says, "I hope when Jon is ready to retire that some of my parents' great-grandchildren may be interested in continuing to keep the farm in the family."