The Little Peddler

When I was a young girl still living on the farm in Indiana, I helped a lot on the farm in the summer. One job I did not mention in Part 1 or Part 2 of 'Growing Up on a Farm In Indiana', is that I was a peddlar of strawberries. One brother, he was the younger of the two boys, would take me and one of my sisters with him in our truck to a nearby town to peddle strawberries. It is surprising how many strawberries people would buy. They seemed to love those big red, juicy home-grown strawberries. My brother's name was Lester, but we called him Budge. How he got that nickname I cannot remember. He would park the truck in a residential area, and we would head out in different directions with a carrier and as many boxes of the strawberries as we could carry to peddle.
When we sold all of the strawberries we had in our carrier, we went back to the truck to get some more to peddle. We would then take a different street or direction and start knocking on doors and ringing doorbells. This was a lot of fun when we got accustomed to it, and most of the people were so nice.

At one time, I found a house where I was not real sure that it would be someone nice. I knocked on the door, but no one answered. Then, I opened the door, and there before me was a long, high stairway. Next, I heard a man's voice call out "Come up here where I'm at." I was too scared to answer or to go up the stairs. I remember my Mom telling me not to go inside a house, especially where the only person I could see was a man. So, I hurried away from that house and back to the truck. I told my brother about my experience, and he said I had done the right thing. He seemed to be quite concerned about me peddling at all.

Then I began to wonder if the man might be crippled or ill, and maybe he couldn't come down the stairs. I figured he could have called something like that down the stairway. My brother said he would never let me go to peddle to that house again.

When we left the town to head home, there was an ice cream place that had the best ice cream cones. If I recall correctly, the best one was called 'double cherry-nut cone,' and it was made of cherry-flavored ice cream with candied cherries and nuts throughout. It was a great treat after peddling strawberries all morning.

Then my Dad paid us a little for peddling - I cannot remember how much. At that time, it didn't sound like much, but a little went farther in those days. He always paid us the same amount he would pay to strangers who worked for him.

Source:

Personal Experience