Keith and Carol Larson: Dad would shoot the tops off of trees for our Christmas tree
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Keith & Carol Larson
By Missy Klatt
Keith and Carol Larson of rural Downing have lived in the area their entire lives. Carol grew up on a farm south of Wilson while Keith is a “townie” who was raised in Downing. Besides a stint in the army Keith has always had a Downing address.
Carol
Carol was the middle child of Louise and Richard Butler. She had one older brother and one younger brother and they were all four years apart. Carol, a self-professed tomboy said she was “Daddy’s girl”. She noted that her grandparents (dad’s mom and dad) lived in part of the house and they lived in the other part. That was until she was about eight and they moved to another farm just about a mile down the road that her uncle used to farm.
“We didn’t get a lot of stuff [for Christmas]” Carol states but, she does remember getting a doll for Christmas when she was five or six years old. She mainly got clothes. Her mom and grandmother were both seamstresses so they would make dresses out of flour sacks for her.
“From Santa what we got wasn’t presents.” Remarked Carol, we got fruit, tangerines and some candy, maybe a cane that would be in their stockings in the morning but they didn’t get a lot of presents.
One year her dad made a toboggan for the whole family when she was young. She remembers her parents putting them on the toboggan while they were on skis. Carol noted that they had a lot more snow back then and her mom and dad would pull them cross country to her aunt and uncle’s farm and she said that they would go right over the top of the fence posts, there was that much snow. She enjoyed these trips as the result was that she got to play with her cousins.
Her dad would also make her and her brothers wooden skis that they played with and used during the winter.
On Christmas day when it was her mom’s turn to host, Carol’s other grandparents and aunt and uncle would usually come over for a big meal with their families. Another chance to play with more cousins. As for the meal itself, it was usually turkey. Carol commented that her mom would spend days and days making cookies, sun buckles (sandbakkels), lefse, and rosettes.
When Carol was five her Grandma Butler died and her grandpa then spent his winters in Texas and summers with them, so Christmas get togethers were mainly with her mom’s side of the family.
This is an example of a dress that Carol’s mom made for her when she was a child. She would have worn a satin undergarment with it.
They always had a Christmas tree that they would cut down every year off the farm, that is except when her dad would shoot the top off a tree with a gun. “My dad was a marksman. We would find a pine tree and if it had a nice looking top …if he couldn’t climb it he would shoot it. Nine chances out of ten, he shot it.” She goes on to say that her dad and older brother would scout out a tree during the summer and see how well it went.
When they moved to the second farm, her dad planted a plot of trees and that’s where they usually picked a tree from. In later years they would all go to pick out a tree, even her mother who said they always picked out too big a tree. “Father would say we just cut it off.” Carol admits sometimes they couldn’t get it through the door.
As for decorating the tree they would decorate with some homemade ornaments as well as some keepsake ones that her mother had. They would also string paper chains and popcorn. “We ate more of the popcorn than I think we strung.” Confesses Carol. Popcorn was always the go to snack at their house, “my dad used to call us corn fed.”
They also had bubble lights and actual tin tinsel that Carol said was thick. Sometimes they would have a garland but not often. They made ornaments at school that were hung on the trees for many years.
At school they always had a Christmas program. For Carol and her siblings that was at Cady Lane, the one room school house that housed all eight grades. Carol noted that in her class it was just her and Mary Kay Bailey that is until Mary Kay moved away after the third grade. Carol was so upset that she moved away, leaving her alone that she refused to go to school so her mother went and talked to the teacher and it was decided that Carol would repeat the third grade so she could be in a class with a couple of other little girls. Mr. Donald Hicks was the teacher at the time.
The Christmas program would consist of a play, songs and everybody had a part. She remembers the school being packed for these programs. Santa would come and gave them a sack of fruit and candy. There would be a decorated tree and Carol said they brought in a riser and hung curtains for the play. She goes on to say that they would practice for one or two weeks depending on the play.
Carol attended Wilson Lutheran Church as a child and they of course put on a Christmas program there as well. Telling the story of Christ’s birth and songs from the different grades and of course songs all sung together as well. “That was usually a big night” Carol remembers. It was always held at night because of the farmers. We always had a new outfit for the program, for Carol usually something her mom or grandmother made.
Keith
Keith claims he doesn’t remember much of Christmas when he was kid. “We didn’t have much of a Christmas back then. We went to Grandpa and Grandma’s for dinner and that was about our Christmas.” states Keith. With eight kids in the family, they didn’t have much.
However, Keith does remember having Christmas trees hanging the same ornaments year after year after year. He said they also had lights for the tree but he doesn’t remember stringing any popcorn. “We had popcorn but we just ate it”, he jokes.
He doesn’t really remember having Christmas programs at school but he said if they had one it would have been at the town hall. “That’s where everything took place in Downing back then.”
Keith went to the Downing Methodist church as a kid but he claims not to have participated too much in any Christmas programs there.
Keith does remember that Downing was a pretty good size town back then with more buildings. There was the box factory, a bank, a mortuary, three taverns, a milk plant, a bowling alley, a hardware store, the school and church of course and the railroad used to go right through town. Keith’s dad used to work at the railroad station sending telegrams. At one time Downing was bigger than Glenwood City.
Bryan
Keith and Carol were married in 1965. They first met because Carol’s brother married Keith’s sister, Sharon who was also a good friend of Carol’s. Keith and Carol have one son, Bryan who was born in 1969. Carol states that they pretty much carried on the same Christmas traditions that they grew up with. She says that Bryan didn’t get much because they didn’t have much back then.
Besides filling his stocking, Bryan also got presents from Santa. Carol recalls one Christmas when Bryan was little that he got a little riding horse on wheels. She chuckles saying she has a picture of Bryan on that horse with a black eye because he got to going too fast and the horse bucked him.
Of course they went to Bryan’s Christmas programs at school and church.
Now they usually get together at Carol’s brother’s place for Christmas.
