Grandpa's Log Cabin

When I was a young lad of about 5 or 6 about 1943 I used to have a set of Lincoln Logs and I had enough logs and roof slats to build a small log cabin. On Sunday about once per month during the summer months my Grandparents Charles and Anna who lived on 18th St. a couple blocks from St Lawrence Church would drive their Model T Ford out to the farm for Sunday Dinner.

After Dinner Grandpa would sit in a rocker and visit with my father Lawrence. One Sunday I got out my logs, got on the floor in front of him and built the log house and he then told me a story about how his father or grandfather lived in a log house very much like the one I built from my Lincoln Log Set. It was a good story as I remember and so each month I would again build the house and hear the story. Don’t really remember how it all went except he just told how tough life was living in a log cabin with no bathroom or running water. And of course no electricity so they just had oil lamps and candles. The cooking was done on a wood stove and the fireplace which also kept them warm in winter. It was not long after that, grandpa got to old to drive out to the country so I guess the story stopped before I got it memorized. I do remember also that when it came time for them to leave before dark usually about 4 or 5 in the afternoon that we would get them into the old Model T and then push them down the hill and the car would start and down the dusty road they would drive back to Lafayette.

My log cabin almost went up in smoke one Sunday but we saved it just in time. Having heard how the candles made the light and how you could see them through the window of the cabin I got permission to put a small candle inside the cabin so Grandpa could see the light from the candle through the window. It looked pretty cool and Grandpa said, yeal that is just the way it was and then we all went to eat dinner and left the light on in the cabin. Pretty soon someone smelled the smoke and we got in there just in time to save my cabin from going up in smoke and maybe the entire house we lived in. From then on I had one side of my roof boards were green and the other side was blackened by the candle fire. So I would always put the green side up and then would sometimes turn them over and remind folks of the near disaster of the log cabin.

When I was older about 12 and this would be about 1950 some of my playmates and myself built a small cabin in the woods west of our home close to Mr. Moyers Pond. It was about 10 feet by 10 feet and about 4 feet tall walls and then we not being carpenters and no help from adults who would know about how to do the roof, we just laid logs flat on the walls and then piled brush and leaves about 4 feet thick on top for a roof. It worked pretty good even in rainy weather. We had to crawl into it as the door was only about 3 feet tall and you could not stand up in it but it was built pretty well and gave us a great sense of accomplishment to have cut the trees, notched them and put it all together all by ourselves. It lasted for maybe 5 or 6 years and was probably home to quite a few animals etc. I did cut my left leg pretty good with my small axe while building the cabin. I missed the tree and put a nice gash in my shin which I still carry the scar to this day. I remember it scared me some and I made it to the house OK and my Mom patched me up with a nice large bandage and advised me to take a day or two off from the big project.

One good lesson learned from the play cabin of age 5 was that I did not use candles in the cabin of age 12. Well that’s about it from the fragile memory banks of Grandpa Jack for awhile, we don’t want to cause a overload or power surge so am signing off for now. But be warned am working on a story about Abe Lincoln for tomorrow....Cabins and Abe kind of like salt and pepper....