REMEMBRANCES OF CHRISTMASES PAST – Judy Knops: “Us kids, we worked in the barn, drove the tractor, helped with hay.”

PROTECTED CONTENT

If you’re a current subscriber, log in below. If you would like to subscribe, please click the subscribe tab above.

Username

Password

Login

Lost your password?

Username and Password Help

Please enter your email and we will send you a password reset link.

Email

Submit

← Back

By Renee Bettendorf

Lifelong Boyceville resident Judy Knops grew up north of town on her parents’ dairy farm along with her sister Vivian Hanestad and brothers Larry and Ronnie. They helped raise Holstein cattle and attended Chimney Rock school.

“You grew up, you worked hard, back then it was so different with all the farmers,” Judy said. “Us kids, we worked in the barn, drove the tractor, helped with hay.”

Judy’s parents were Minnie and Joseph Polonec and their farm was on the banks of the Hay River near what is now the Tiffany Town Hall. Her brother Larry and his wife Cheryl still live and farm there.

“Anyway, back in the sticks, I always say, just, you know, a mile from the Tiffany Town Hall,” said Judy, when describing where she grew up.

That town hall used to be Chimney Rock school and Judy and her sister and brothers were students there. She said that the class sizes at Chimney Rock were very small, often just two students per grade with less than 20 students in the whole school.

The school always put on a Christmas program and each student had a part to learn and perform. One year Judy remembers playing the part of Mrs. Santa Claus at the program. All the parents came to the programs and the students sang songs and said their parts.

“So different, a one room school…lot different from now, how stuff has changed!” she said. 

When Judy was going to Chimney Rock the school had a stage and in addition to Christmas programs they also put on Halloween programs. She remembers being Little Red Riding Hood at one of the Halloween programs. 

“It was like one big family out there,” she said of her country school.

Judy attended Chimney Rock up until sixth grade, then the state of Wisconsin consolidated the country schools and they closed. After the closure, she attended seventh and eighth grades and high school in Boyceville. She graduated from BHS in 1964 and celebrated her 60th class reunion in August.

“What a change that was!” said Judy of going from a one room schoolhouse to school in town. 

Judy said that her family would sometimes cut a Christmas tree out of the woods on their farm if one looked good, otherwise they would buy one in town. They decorated Christmas trees with big lights, ornaments and tinsel.  

“It was always a real tree,” she said. “You had those bigger lights back then and sometimes they would get so hot!”

On Christmas Eve, the Polonecs did chores and usually got done a little early. Judy’s mom would have a big supper of sauerkraut and kielbasa waiting. Sauerkraut and kielbasa is a common Christmas Eve or Christmas Day dish in eastern European countries, especially Slovakia which was where Judy’s dad’s family was from.

Judy’s mom’s family was Norwegian but she never served Lutefisk. Instead Judy’s mom would make Sandbakkels, a type of Norwegian Christmas cookie that is baked in a tin. She also used to serve birthday cake on Christmas Eve because that was Judy’s brother Ronnie’s birthday. 

They opened their presents on Christmas Eve. Judy and her sister usually got a new dress, pajamas, books and sometimes dolls. One year they both got doll buggies and they had a lot of fun with them. 

Judy said that before Boyceville started holding Cucumber Fest, the town had a celebration called the fall festival and during that event there would be a kiddie parade. Kids would decorate their bikes or dress up and walk or ride along the parade route. Judy and Vivian decorated their doll buggies and pushed them through that parade one year.

On Christmas Day Judy’s family would go to Frank and Bessie Kalnicky’s farm which was also located north of Boyceville. Bessie was Judy’s dad’s sister and it was just those two kids in that family. They had Christmas dinner and then the Polonec kids would go sliding with their cousins Richard and Dennis. The Kalnicky farm had a nice sledding hill and they would go down it with toboggans or runner sleds.

“Not those plastic things they have now,” she said. “That seems like a 100 years ago!”

When she was a little older, Judy remembers going Christmas shopping. If you went shopping in Boyceville there was Sandy Lewis’s grocery story. The store, which was called Sandy’s Square Deal Store, was located where the WestCAP food pantry is today. 

“There was everything in there, that was like a department store,” she said.

Sometimes they would go to downtown Eau Claire to go Christmas shopping or to Menomonie. In downtown Menomonie there was the Farmers Store which was located where Burger King is currently and there was a Montgomery Ward, the building is still there, Judy thinks its a bank now.

Judy said that at the Farmers Store they didn’t have a bunch of checkouts. They had one cash register that was located upstairs. When a customer bought an item, a sales associate would load the money into a metal cup that was attached to a cable and the cup would move along the cable up to the register where a cashier would make change and then send the cup back.

“I should probably be about 150 years old by now talking like that!” joked Judy. 

Some other winter activities Judy did as a kid included ice fishing and attempting to ice skate. She would go ice fishing with her dad and they would compete in the Northwest Rod and Gun Club ice fishing contest in Menomonie every year.

And living near the Hay River had its advantages. Judy and her sister and brothers used to go down to the river and clear the snow off the ice and try to ice skate. But she was never very good on skates.

“I could do pretty good on one skate! No that wasn’t for me! It looks easy! I like to watch them on TV,” she said.

In the fall her family used to pick bushels of mushrooms. The mushrooms grew in the woods by their farm. After they picked them they would dry the mushrooms in their basement on screens that they rotated near a wood stove.

“The good old days, huh? Holy cow!” laughed Judy.

After high school Judy worked at the Agricultural Stabilization Conservation Service office, which was located in Menomonie at the old court house. She did secretarial work there for a few years. Then she got a job at Gale Rasmusson’s bakery and coffee shop in Glenwood City as a waitress.

While working at the bakery, Judy met her future husband, John Knops, who also worked in Glenwood City. He worked for the Midland co-op driving the gas and fuel truck and grew up on a farm north of town. They were married on September 6, 1969 at St. Johns in Glenwood City.

When they were first married John and Judy would celebrate Christmas Eve and Christmas Day by visiting their folks. Later, after their two sons, Bobby and Danny were born, they enjoyed cutting a real Christmas tree, decorating it and putting presents under it.

“We had two boys I give a lot of machinery…metal stuff, baler…cripes…elevator, all that stuff,” she said.  

John and Judy lived in or near Boyceville for a number of years before purchasing their home in town in 1981. Judy still lives there, John passed away in 2005. They have four grandchildren and seven great grandchildren.

After they bought their house in Boyceville, Judy did in-home daycare for 21 years starting in 1982. At one point both of her sons and her husband were all on the Boyceville fire department together. This year for Christmas she plans on heading out to her brother’s farm and also visiting with her kids.

“Time goes so fast, the older you get…it just flies by,” she said.