Winsiders (?) are clever

"March 9, 2002:  Clear and sunny this morning but only 14 degrees.  Anna and Mitch here this evening.
March 10, 2002:  Nice day.  Nancy came for dinner.  I took a shower and then we went to Diane A.'s home (Allen's wife).  Saw Diane's 13 birds -- all had names -- parakeets and cockatoos.  Nancy and Diane went over the names of those attending Allen's funeral.  The largest cockatoo called, "Mom! Mom!" when Diane left the room when we were going home!
March 11, 2002:  Nine people played Seven-Up this evening."

I am thinking Nancy remembers this day.  Since we aren't "bird people" in our family, I imagine Grandma got a kick out of seeing all those birds.  Her exclamation point rather makes my case, I think.

I am enjoying the Winside history book, so here's some more.  I had the pick of a fire, some gruesome murders, or this story.  I picked the happier one.

Stored Oats -- 1895

In 1895 everyone had a fair crop of corn and an exceptionally good crop of oats.  Oats being low in price, R. R. Smith, the manager of the P. V. Elevator Co., stored 5000 bushels in the bin for higher prices.  Later when the oats were still in the bin, Mr. F. H. Peavy, the president of the company came down to see Mr. Smith about it as it did not sound reasonable that he could possibly have that much oats in a bin of that dimension.  The Bonding Company and the Insurance Company representatives also came into town and asked about it, figured, stormed around, told the town people that the man was crazy.

Mr. Smith, (commonly known as P. V. Smith, as there were several Smiths here at the time) had been studying up on elevators and equipment from magazines and books and had come across a device a man had made to measure oats in the bin without removing them.  He went over to Frank Tracy's Hardware and had him make a funnel device that could be run down in the oats bin, which was about 18 feet deep and very little head room above, that would take a test of the oats.  This was done by using pump rod in short sections and added as the test device went down into the bin.

Mr. Woodard, the superintendent under Mr. Peavy, was here at the time, and he donned overalls and went with Mr. Smith to the top of the bin that was to be measured with this "new idea".  They spent about a half a day testing in different spots, going down to the floor each time and placing the samples that they brought up in a test measure.  This was taken down and weighed, upset on a paper and examined for sand and dirt.  There was no sand or grit in the oats and it weighed 48 pounds to the bushel.

A little later this oats was shipped out by rail to the Great Lakes for European export and it weighed the same amount, 48 pounds to the bushel.  -- R. R. Smith.

One must note that the author of this submission to the history book is R. R. Smith, the same Mr. Smith in the article, or a relative, so there may be a teensy bit of bias in the reporting, but I do not care.  I love this story and I think Grandpa would have gotten a kick out of it.  (Perhaps he read the same history book and knew this story.)  I can somewhat visualize the suspicious company folk and the calm, mild-mannered Mr. Smith getting the job done in spite of them.  I think I may watch too many movies . . .

But I digress.  The mention that R. R. Smith was known as P. V. Smith (from the name of the elevator, obviously) put me in mind of family talking about nicknames for people back in the day, again because there was more than one person with the same first and last names.  The only ones I remember are Whistle Pete (who whistled), Fiddle Chris (who played the fiddle) and I believe Forty Pete (who owned 40 acres).  Gotta love it.