Windmill
Overnight Tuesday came an e-mail from a friend, commenting on a Frank Lloyd Wright home she know, somewhere.
The reference jogged me to think back to mid-October, 2013, visiting Wright’s Taliesin, Spring Green WI, and seeing a unique windmill there (see photos at end of this post). In turn, that caused me to think of another windmill found at the North Dakota farm around the time of my Uncle’s death in 2015, which I came across in a box a short while ago. It is below, simply a piece of farm art on a scrap piece of wood, doubtless a cooperative creation of persons very familiar with windmills, prairie farms and water.
I don’t know who did the above creation, measuring about 7″x12″. It is likely a photo from a farm magazine glued on a piece of scrap lumber and then varnished to become a piece of home grown decoupage. It was a hobby which I remember seemed to have caught on like a prairie wildfire among my elders for a time. If there was a ‘culprit’, I would put my Aunt Florence near ground zero for planting the seed to decoupage. But it could have been my mom, or any to the other sisters or female aunts. You know how such things go.
Show this photo to anyone who’s ever had a close call with an old farm, and it will bring forth lots of memories. Windmills were the farm “water works” – a source of hopefully fresh water from a fairly shallow well.
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The windmill at Taliesin has its own story, which the internet helpfully searched for me. Here, you can read the short story.
In a way, those windmills are like all of us. In their lives they’ve seen a lot, and done a lot.
Unlike us, they spent their time stuck in place. Most of us are capable of more flexibility, and making more of an impact than we feel we’re stuck with.
We take many things for granted, these days, which folks couldn’t imagine not all that many years ago. Rural electricity replaced wind power on my grandparents farm in 1949. An interesting diary of another North Dakotan adds to that story. You can read the article here.
Now another spring begins. A good time to take another look at how we, as individuals, can positively impact the status quo. And then ‘spring’ into action!
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Bonus PREVIEW, especially for those whose ancestry includes French-Canadian and/or Midwest. Visit the French American Heritage Foundation website (here) , click Library tab, click books, and scroll down to Roy-Collette Family History. This is brand new, a French-Canadian family story from France, to Quebec, to the United States, to the Twin Cities area, North Dakota, Ste Elizabeth, Manitoba and Lampman, Saskatchewan. This is author Remi Roy’s paternal grandparents story. At least scroll through the document. There will be a specific post on the book later in April, but the entire 315 page book is available. Disclosure: Remi Roy and I are cousins through the Collette line. At the same site is my 400+ page French-Canadian family history, Bernard-Collette Family History, which is also available in its entirety, from 2010.
COMMENTS (more at end of post):
from Fred: Liked the Taliesen windmill. We visited Frank Lloyd Wright’s Spring Green hangout probably around the same time you did. I don’t remember the windmill, though. We greatly enjoyed the visit. Wright actually influenced how we sited the house we are now in. Instead of going up a few stories for a better river view, we opted for a land-conforming walkout rambler style. It still feels like the right decision.
from Lois: Happy Easter Dick – may you continue to send “thoughts towards a better world” for a long, long time. I enjoyed thoughts of windmills on my mom’s family farm.
I have heritage of 9X great grandparents who arrived from France in the early 1600s as well as 8X GGF from Netherlands – this was a nice reminder of my ancestors. The first family to settle in Luverne area of Rock County originated in England – to Salem MA and left for Canada after death of 2ndgeneration mothers execution as a witch. Their journey continued to reach here thru Wisconsin in the mid- late 1800’s.
from Mary: Hi Dick, Yes for sure my mom [Florence] was into decoupaging. I have a few of her pieces. She loved Norman Rockwell calendars. Also wedding invitations. She asked our dentist who was located in Hannaford ND for his old dental tools. She carved her edges with those. Never on barn wood that I saw, but dad cut her boards for her. She taught classes the County Extension Service and home makers clubs. My mom was always busy and very gifted with her hands. Loved her so much.
We still have the counterweight to the 1880s windmill on the Weller family farm. It is a cast iron rooster, of course. Co-co-ri-co!!
My wife and I have visited Taliesin Green as well although I do not remember that windmill tower, but I am sure that we saw it when we were there. A beautiful organic design as would be expected from Wright, of course. We also stopped at the nearby House on a Rock but got there just before the exhibit closed for the day so did not go inside. Lots of the old windmills around for pumping water out of the wells below them including one on the farm that my wife grew up on in western Wisconsin.
Definitely the decoupage was done by uncle Vince. He was precise in the trim on the wood and kept his hobby going mostly in the winters . Most themes were animals,Midwest landscapes and farm items. Some were gifted…uncle art was also crafty and painted American lighthouses which became lampposts…they were table lamps….Gus berning their double cousin repaired my silver turquoise ring when he noticed a stone missing at a reunion.
Thank you. Your response makes a lot of sense. For a long while I had one of Art’s lighthouse lamps. I must have given it to someone. And I know Gus Berning did have an interest as you describe. Of course, they are all long gone now, and we’re left to carry on. So goes life.