In the mid 1950’s, my dad was General Manager of The Plymouth Foundry. His role as accountant and CPA had evolved into more responsibility. The ower of the Foundry, Rich Goldberg was from Saukville, Wisconsin and had family money to invest. He bought a 200 acre farm south of Cascade and put Bucky in charge (in addition to the Foundry).
The farm had an old farm house that was slowly remodeled so that guests could stay overnight. Remodeling seemed to take forever.
Ponds were dredged into the landscape near a stream and stocked with rainbow trout. The idea was to entertain customers by letting them fish from the ponds.
A couple of horses were purchased for Goldberg and his family.
Prized white faced cattle were purchased to generate some income along wtih chickens for egg production. Some land was leased for production of corn, hay and wheat.
You guessed it! My brother Jack and primarily myself got roped into going out to the farm to help with farm duties. For several years there was little doubt on what we did in our spare time. We’d ride out to the farm to feed the trout, collect the eggs, feed the horses and tend the cattle. In the summer, we helped harvest hay and filled silo’s with silage. You have to think about this arrangement. Goldberg buys a hobby farm, my dad assumes management and Jack and I do all the work. What the hell?
Actually there were lots of good moments. Learning the trout business was interesting and we got to fish. We did get to ride the horses. I was never interested in hunting, but the farm was stocked with pheasants and Bucky and Alice’s brother Jerry would go bow and arrow hunting. My hunting memory was “Big Jerry” stalking a pheasant in a corn field and flushing it out. As the pheasant took flight, Jerry took a shot with a arrow and put it right into the middle of the bird. It was an impossible shot and Jerry probably never did it again. The bird flapped and flopped around for several minutes until he was dead. We had pheasant for supper. By the way, there isn’t a lot of meat on a pheasant.
So what did Goldberg do? He bought another 300 arcres adjacent to the first farm to raise more cattle. Heck, running a farm was easy.
Chuck and Jack never got paid. Once I got my drivers license, my dad didn’t even go out to the farm. He just sent his slave labor, Chuck and Jack.
Bucky died in 1957 about the time the farms were really getting developed. I don’t know if the Goldberg family held on to the farms or not.
I will say that the Cascade farms were an interesting experience. It was an extravagant hobby for the Goldbergs. It was work for the Andrews with a few benefits thrown in. It also kept me away from my girl friend. Who do you think that was?
By the time I was 17, I knew quite a bit about the Foundry business, the tavern business and hobby farms. I am sure that there were many lessons in all of that that helped me in my own career.
Come to think of it, my Dad was a pretty smart guy!
Love,
Dad