The Heart Remembers: Recollections of a Ninety-Year-Old Man

By Helmuth R. Krause

About the Book
The Heart Remembers: Recollections of a Ninety-Year-Old Man tells the true story of Helmuth R. Krause, a man defined by his honesty, hard-work, and love of family. Helmuth R. Krause was born in Marathon County, Wisconsin in 1932. He grew up in a hard-working farm family, a lifestyle that he has proudly passed on to his children and grandchildren. This story is the journey of a young boy of mixed blood born during the depression into poverty. He shares the many lessons he learned and the people he met throughout more than nine decades. He hopes to inspire others to be appreciative of all people, all animals, and all land.
About the Author
Helmuth and his wife Ruth live on 160 acres of farmland and forest in hilly, rural southwest, Wisconsin. Together they raised four children and have ten grandchildren. They are well known maple syrup producers and have been a fixture at regional farmers' markets for 35 years. Helmuth enjoys being in the woods, gardening, and spending time with his family. He is a keen observer of nature and knows the importance of being a good steward of the land. He has made an impact in his community by contributing to community benefits and local food pantries, which serve as only a small part of his legacy. At ninety years old, he still helps out on the family farm, grows a large garden, and runs the family’s maple syrup production.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company
• Release date: Jan 19, 2024
• ISBN: 9798890277343

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The contents of this work, including, but not limited to, the accuracy of events, people, and places depicted; opinions expressed; permission to use previously published materials included; and any advice given or actions advocated are solely the responsibility of the author, who assumes all liability for said work and indemnifies the publisher against any claims stemming from publication of the work.

All Rights Reserved

Copyright © 2024 by Helmuth R. Krause

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted, downloaded, distributed, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, including photocopying and recording, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Dedicated to my younger sister, Irene, who was so brutally beaten as a child because of who she was and to the many kind and caring people who reached out a helping hand in my life’s journey. There is a special place in my heart for them.

The Heart Remembers:

Recollections of a Ninety-Year-Old Man

On November 28, 1932, a cold winter day in Merrill, Wisconsin, a son was born to a poor 50-year-old farmer and his wife. He was a rather small, fragile child of only about six pounds. The first winter, he was often sick with colic, but he always recovered quite quickly and got stronger each time. That boy was me and this is my story.

The farmer wasn’t always poor. He was born in 1882, one year after his parents migrated from Pomerania, Germany. As soon as he was old enough, he got a job as a stone driller in a granite quarry, a good paying job. He bought eighty acres of land and built a house and barn on it. He then cleared about half of it while building up a sizable bank account. He was doing so well that he hired a housekeeper, a beautiful young woman of mixed blood- part German, part English, and part Native American.

He was living the American dream. He took the young woman as his bride a year later in 1928 at the age of 46. Then a year later in October of 1929, it all changed. The stock market crashed and soon after that the banks closed, keeping everyone’s money. A little while later the stone quarry started laying off workers. My dad was one of them. Now there was no money, no job, and the kids started to come.

First there was Adeline, born on December 5, 1929. Next was George, born on June 22, 1931. I, Helmuth, came on November 28, 1932. Irene followed on August 28, 1935, and Philip came on June 15, 1938. The baby of the family was born on January 28, 1942. Her name was Dorothy. At that time, there were no government programs to provide aid to struggling families. How our parents kept us fed and clothed in the early times, I have no clue.

I remember we had about twelve cows we milked by hand, about a dozen female mink that were raised for fur, two to three hundred chickens, and about a half dozen female rabbits. We raised the young for meat. We ate a lot of rabbit; it was very tasty. About 200 unsexed leghorn chicks were bought each spring. The hens were kept for lying eggs. The roosters were butchered and fried when they got big enough. The eggs from the leghorn hens were sold and that was Ma’s money. Dad set about a dozen heavy hens each year, and we ate their eggs and the chicks. We raised roosters both to be sold and to eat. We ate a lot of chicken. Each year a couple young calves were allowed to suck until they were around 200 pounds. Then they were butchered for veal- also very good meat. Two piglets were bought each spring and when it got cold in the fall they were butchered. No part of the pig was wasted including the blood which was caught to make blood sausage. The pig was dipped in hot water to loosen the hair that was then scraped off. The intestines were taken out and cleaned for sausage casing. The sausages, the hams, and bacon were then placed in a small building where they were smoked to preserve the meat and enhance the flavor. For fresh eating, some were placed in a barrel on the north side of the house where it was cold enough it would keep. Some were also packed in the lard that was rendered out. The head was used to make head cheese. Even the brain was fried and eaten. It was said, The only part of a pig not used was the squeal.

Our family had a big garden, maybe an acre in size. The potato bin was huge and thick and held about twenty bushels. It was a good year when it was full. The strawberry patch was spacious. We always had strawberry shortcake on George’s birthday, June 22. We picked wild berries to eat and make jams and jellies. There was a huge blackberry patch about a mile away near the Wisconsin River. In late August, we would take milk pails to that patch and fill them to the brim. Despite the hard times and not having any money, at no time can I ever remember going hungry. Our parents saw to that.

I was told as a child that it was hard to keep me in the house. I was most often out in the field or woods or down by the creek, where I wasn’t supposed to be. I remember when I was about seven years old, to my surprise, I saw a deer track out in the woods. We seldom saw deer in our neck of the woods, so later that fall, when there was snow on the ground, I was determined to find another. I couldn’t stay out of the woods, at least until I found another track. One evening I finally found one and followed it. There was a strong northwest wind in my face, so the deer didn’t know I was tracking it. After about two miles, I came to a really brushy area that had probably been logged twenty or so years earlier. That is when a big buck jumped out and let out a shrill whistle. It was only about fifty feet away. Along with it were three other deer. What a magnificent sight! When I finally arrived home, it had already been dark for a few hours, all hell broke loose. I got a strapping for that, but I didn’t mind. The adventure was well worth it.

Another early memory was when I poked a piece of wood through the top of my foot; it became infected and swollen. I was taken to the doctor who cut it open but couldn’t find anything. Sometime later, we were visiting Mother’s folks in Tomahawk, WI. Her mother, who was half Indian, said to take leaves from the plantain weed and bandage it over the wound and change it each day. It took about a week to draw out a big sliver and all the infection, but it worked.

At the age of five years and nine months, I started school at a one room schoolhouse with all eight grades. About forty kids attended in all. The school was very modern for that time. It was the only school in the rural area to have a basement with a wood furnace and central heating instead of a potbelly stove. There also was the luxury of indoor bathrooms. Chemicals were used to control the odor during the school year and at the end of the year someone was hired to clean them out. Each year, bids were put out to supply the wood needed for the year. Usually the Woller family, a family with six boys, got the bid, but one year Dad got it. We spent every second of spare time that spring and summer making wood. Dad even hired his nephew, Ed Raddatz, to help. We also made wood for our own furnace, cookstove, and wood to cook our maple syrup. In other words, it was a lot of wood. We would skid it up in a big pile then we would get Mr. Rosenkarter, who had a circle saw run by an oil pull engine that burned kerosene, to cut it up. We would need a crew of about six men- four to carry the logs and place them on the table, one to push the logs into the saw, and one to take the blocks that were sawed and toss them aside. Surprisingly, this was the most dangerous job. Every so often somebody would lose a finger. I don’t think Dad ever bid on that job again.

That first year in school is when I first knew about me being part Indian. A large girl in the 4th or 5th grade started to tease me about it. I asked my dad, and he said that yes, Ma was part Indian, a Winnebago, now known as the Ho Chunk. When I asked my dad for advice on how to handle the situation, he said, You have two choices, pay no attention or fight her. I chose to fight, but unfortunately, that didn’t work out too well, as she just tossed me to the ground and sat on me. Her brother Ruben tried to help me but got the same punishment. That went on until spring when I finally had had enough. I knew I was very quick, so at recess, I went to the woods next to the school yard and got two hazelnut switches. I gave her one and kept the other. I told her to fight me this way or be a big coward. She took the challenge. We went at each other’s faces. I was a lot faster than her. Before the teacher was out to break us up, she was the one crying. I don’t remember ever being teased in school by anyone again.  It was four years later when mom had Dorothy; it was this same neighbor girl who came over to help. She was not a bad person at all, just misunderstood.

School was really going well. I just loved to read, and other than spelling, it was easy for me to learn. To this day, I still can’t spell. In the subjects that I liked (math, history and geography), I was an A or A+ student. I loved playing during recess. We often played softball, with teams being chosen by captains who would start to pick their players in order until all that wanted to play were taken. Another game was Batter Up. It consisted of three batters, and as they made outs, they went to the back of the line in the outfield and then the next player would move up until all had a chance to bat. Sometimes this could take days if all the big kids had their at bat and the little ones were in the outfield. That’s why often the littlest ones got the first chance to bat. Another game we played was tag, in which one player called it and then chased the others until he tagged another, who then became it. Then there was this sort of a dangerous game, called Crack the Whip, where a line of kids would join hands. The bigger ones were at the head and the little ones were at the end. Then the head of the line would start to circle while barely moving. The end of the line would keep going faster and faster; the longer the line, the faster they went. Suddenly, the head of the line would reverse. The line would crack like a whip. If the kids didn’t hang on, they would go flying through the air. My brother George was on the end of one of the really long lines when the whip cracked. He went flying through the air for about twenty feet. He landed on his shoulder and broke his collarbone. That was the last he played Crack the Whip.

Mr. Rinhart Lataiz was our teacher. He was very strict and enforced his rules using a rope about 1 thick with hard knots tied in it. One day one of the kids wrote something on the blackboard that was less than flattering. Mr. Lataiz asked who it did, but nobody answered. So, he picked out my sister Irene, one of the smallest girls in school. He asked her who did it. She said she didn’t know. I don’t think she did know; I know I didn’t. He asked her again, and again she said she didn’t know, so he gave her a whack with the rope. This went on for a while, and each time he hit her harder. Irene never cried. She no longer would answer him, she just looked up and stared at him. Mr. Lataiz went berserk, he quoted, I will beat the damn Indian out of you." He continued to beat that little girl until the back of her dress was soaked in blood. We just sat there horrified. That scene, over eighty years ago, haunts me to this day. Anyway, us Krause kids picked up and went home that day.

What bothers me most, when I dare to think about it, is why I just sat there and let it happen. I should have picked up a stove poker and beat that filthy bastard’s brains out. When we got home that day, our parents took Irene to a doctor and then that evening to see Emil Rusck, who was on the school board. The county school board superintendent, Irene Kronewetter, got involved and Mr. Lataiz’s license to teach was taken away. There was no school for several days until a new teacher was found. He was Mr. Arnold Marks. He had retired from teaching and was raising chickens on a small farm near Wausau. How no charges for beating a child so brutally were ever brought against Mr. Lataiz, we will never know, although some speculate it was because the child was part Indian. Mr. Marks stayed for the rest of the school year. He was a very kind and good teacher, but the next year there was a new teacher, a woman teacher. I don’t remember her name. I was now in the 7th grade. After the incident in which Irene was so badly beaten, I had little use for school. I missed fifty-three days of school that year,  most during the maple syrup season. In a one room school, you can listen to the next grade’s lessons, so that’s what I did, learning the material before I even got to it, allowing me to pass all the tests and still get all As.

I decided to ask if I could take the test with the eighth-grade class, and if I passed, I could graduate with the eighth graders. My request went to the county superintendent of schools, Irene Kronewetter, who approved it. I don’t think she thought I would pass. I took the test that spring. Sometime later, Mrs. Kronewetter came out to the farm. Not only had I passed the test, but I had also written one of the highest scores in the county. She insisted I keep up with schooling. There were no buses in those days; the high school was ten miles away. She thought she could find a family in Wausau I could stay with, but I said no. I wanted no part of school anymore. Some would say I had a big chip on my shoulder and maybe I did. As for my sister Irene, the one who was beaten, she continued to love school.

Radio was popular at that time, and there was a radio program students listened to in school called Ranger Max. It was all about the outdoors. In 7th grade in 1948, Irene entered a scrapbook contest sponsored by Ranger Max.  Her book topped the county and went on to state. It didn’t win there, so the next year, in 1949, Irene entered the contest again and it topped the county and went on to state. This time it took first place. Irene’s scrapbooks are now on display at the Immigration Historical Center in the town of Berlin, Marathon County, Wisconsin. Irene continued getting high grades and went on to high school. She stayed with a family in Wausau in exchange for doing housework and helping with the children. She attended college in Stevens Point and then went on to work as a stewardess out of Kansas City. After a number of years, she came back to her hometown of Wausau, Wisconsin. She got a job with Wausau Mutual Insurance as a secretary. She moved up the ladder quickly to become head of a policy writers’ department.

Sadly, however, in 1979, Irene was diagnosed with breast cancer. The next summer Irene and her husband Joe Brzezinski traveled out west and visited many Indian reservations and historical sights. In the fall of 1981, on November 4, she passed away. Her funeral was the biggest funeral I have ever attended. This was certainly a testament to the person she was.    

In 1942, World War II was going on. Most of the young men were in the service, so there was a severe labor shortage. We had about ½ acre of beans on our own farm that we would pick twice a week by hand. Two to three times a week I would get on the bus to go to the bean fields around Stevens Point, about twenty miles south in the Sand County area. Here a lot of vegetables were grown, and strawberry picking started in the middle of June. About a month later the beans would start. To get enough help, a bus would be sent out to pick up workers. The work force consisted mostly of women, teenage girls, and kids over ten years of age. German prisoners of war were also used as part of the workforce. I don’t think you will find this in the history books, as using prisoners of war and kids as young as ten was most certainly against the law, but history books do not tell all and I know this to be true as I was one of the workers.  

The German prisoners that were used were young teenage boys who had volunteered to work. In my eyes, there appeared to be a lot of flirting going on between the teenage girls and the young prisoners. It was rumored that sometimes a young prisoner would meet a girl and then not show up at his barracks until the next morning. Anyhow, a good share of America’s workforce during the war years were the women and us kids.

During the war years, Dad got a job back with the granite company as a setup man for the stone polishers. Us kids were big enough to handle most of the work on the farm. Then in the early winter of 1947, Dad had a heart attack at work. I don’t remember how his car got back home, maybe a cousin who worked at the same place brought it home. Mom hadn’t learned how to drive yet, so I was to be the driver. I had just turned fourteen. I didn’t have a license to drive, yet away to the hospital in Wausau we went. I remember we got to town and came to a red stop light. I stopped, and nobody was in sight, so I went through it. It made sense to me. A half block later, I noticed a police car behind me with flaring red lights and a siren going. I stopped, and the policeman came over and said I had run a red light. I disagreed. I had stopped, and nobody was coming, so I took off again. The policeman said, That’s not the way it works. You must wait for a green light before you continue on.

Surprised, I said, Oh. He asked for my driver’s license, and of course, I said I didn’t have one. We then told the officer our story and that we were looking for the hospital. We were told it was on Grand Avenue. Before the family had always seen doctors in Merrill, so we didn’t know our way around Wausau.

The policeman said, First follow me down to the police station, then I will show you where it is. We followed the policeman in our car to the police station. I asked if he was going to throw me in jail. The policeman said no, he was going to give me a temporary driver’s license and a rule book, which I was to study. I was to come back and take a test to get a regular one. The policeman then had us follow him to the hospital on Grand Avenue. I wonder how that would play out today. Back in the days, the police always viewed their job as to help those who needed help.

Back in the 1930s and 1940s, we farmed only with horses, much like the Amish still do today. The first horse I remember was a spirited, hard-working black horse that was very gentle around us kids. She only weighed about 1200 pounds but could out-pull most horses weighing up to sixteen hundred pounds. She was our pet and we liked to ride her around bareback. She was paired up with an old pug we called Barney. Barney came about because Dad lost a horse, Bessie, who had been paired with the black horse. Dad didn’t have much money at the time and a friend of his named Barnard Krowalski had an older horse he was going to sell to the fox farm for a few dollars because he had a bigger farm and needed a younger horse. So Dad got this horse who we named Barney after Barnard. When we went to town, we passed his farm and dropped off eggs and sometimes a dressed chicken, as Barnard did not raise chickens. This is how we paid for the horse. I think Barney was ours for three years before he died.

Dad then had a western horse, a bronco we called