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"When Father was living with us after Mother Clark's death—or I should say, we were living with him in his home—Homer went to Chicago to the World's Fair to drive a car back for William. Father was helping me (in 1934) to milk the eighteen cows by hand. Father was just finishing his fourth cow, a fourteen-quart bucket held between his knees and filled to the top with foaming milk. Suddenly the cow lifted her foot, placed it in the bucket, and stepped forward, overturning the milk.  Father was milk-soaked to his knees, and I smiled expecting him to say at least a little slang word. But what I heard was "Well, well, well, well...well... WELL," each 'well' being stronger in tone. He went to the house, changed his wet clothing, and back he came as though nothing had happened, to finish the milking."⁸

"In 1945, Grandfather was harnessing and bridling a horse, and it took a step forward, right onto Grandfather's foot. His reaction was to pat the horse's neck to get it to move while exclaiming, "Heavy horse!  Heavy horse!"⁷

As America's industrial prosperity of the Roaring Twenties soared to increasingly greater heights, farm families, including those at Springdale, found themselves faring less affluently. The unfortunate circumstances of the decade, plus the absence from the farm of most of the Clark boys, as well as other factors, all contributed toward Springdale's economic decline in the Twenties.  Thanks to "Aunt Millie's" excellent management, the home, the ice cream factory, and the farm all survived; and thanks to the help of newly independent sons, Springdale Farm endured a near-sale in 1926 to pay off the farm mortgage.

By the time of the Great Depression, and as all the children had grown and married, Springdale Farm had largely