Looking Back: Summer in the Valley

by Marcia Napier, Grain Valley Historical Society
 

Some days you “just got nothin’ to write about” and this is one of those days.  I haven’t been at the Historical Society for a couple of weeks to get inspired by something I see there or something I read. So, please bear with me as I reminisce about “the good old days" of summer, growing up in Grain Valley.

Perhaps it will prompt you to remember your growing up years, be it the 1950s, 60s, 70s, or even a summer in the present century! The last day of school marked the beginning of summer and if that wasn’t it then certainly Memorial Day was just a few days away.  In our family, it was “Decoration Day” and we were up early and off to decorate the graves of some ancestors I had never met, but was told they had been my aunt or grandparents or some such relation. 

I particularly remember visiting the grave of my baby brother, although he would have been older than me by four and a half years. Somehow, I was always sad that I never knew him, but I had another older brother who was living and so all was good! After “paying respects” and leaving flowers at no less than three or four cemeteries, we gathered with the family for a picnic at my aunt’s house.  That was always good because it included chocolate pie!

June was filled with riding bikes, playing in the sand box or helping mom, grandmother and my aunt in the garden.  I even remember helping Uncle Clyde plant beans. He paid me 1-cent for every two feet, my feet, which paid more because they were small.  I remember walking it off twice, but it only came up 46 feet, or 23-cents, so I charged him two cents tax and went home with a quarter; big money in 1951!

July was a great month. There wasn’t only the Fourth of July and another family picnic (this time the featured dessert was homemade ice cream), there was also Vacation Bible School. It lasted two weeks and that meant two weeks seeing my friends every day. That was a big deal when you lived on a farm and didn’t have close neighbors to play with each day. We didn’t have super heroes back then, but I can remember being “Pioneers for Christ,” a Western theme, and a nautical theme where Guy Burnett and Woody Graham built a gang plank to walk from the Church aisle to the alter.

In my later years (10-17) August was filled with 4-H activities and fairs; the local Achievement Day, the County 4-H Fair, the Jackson County Fair and the Missouri State Fair. Life didn’t get any better that showing our cattle in a 95-degree show ring with absolutely no shade! We were dressed in blue jeans, long sleeve western shirts, complete with boots and a cowboy hat.  I guess we thought we looked so cool the August heat didn’t matter. The only downside to the Missouri State Fair was that it was the week before school started up again.

But we still had a few days of summer because in the 1950s and 60s, school did not start until AFTER Labor Day.
 
I hope this has generated some great childhood memories for you.  If you need more encouragement to “look back”, come to the Historical Society’s Old Fashioned Ice Cream Social on Thursday, July 25th from 5 to 8 PM.  Enjoy homemade ice cream and desserts. We will be on the patio next to our building (506 Main Street, Downtown Grain Valley) or you can escape the heat an eat inside! Hope to see you there.