Crossing the River by Ferry

May 30, 1930  Mama, Jacob, Corney, and I went to Steinbach; but first we butchered two turkeys.  We sold them in Morris for $5.25.  Then we crossed the river on the ferry at St. Pier and then going toward Gruenfeld.   We were at H. R. Duecks for dinner.  Then we went to Dr. Kroeker because of the boys’ eyes.   Then to Steinbach to Widow Johan Reimer.  Johan W. Reimers came over there.  Then we went to Klaas K. Friesens and for night to D. K. S.

Now that the wheat and barley were planted, the Siemens went on a round of visiting, shopping, and business.  Before going to town, they butchered and dressed a couple turkeys to pay for the things that they would buy in Morris.  In the days before commercial farming, farmers usually had produce, fruit, poultry, or dairy products that they could sell in town to the urbanites who did not have their own gardens or animals.  Then they drove east to do visiting and doctoring. 

In southeastern Manitoba at this time there were very few bridges and many more ferries.  Because the rivers flooded often, bridges were easily washed away.  Bridges were more expensive to build than a ferry.  Margaret did not enjoy boats and water (not surprising since there was little of either in southwestern Kansas), so the new experience of crossing rivers by ferry was probably not a pleasant one for her. 

Red River ferry in North Dakota in the pre-automotive days.  You can see why a wife from Kansas would probably not have enjoyed crossing on a ferry.

The Siemens crossed the Rat River at St. Pierre-Jolys on a ferry and then when to Gruenfeld, the original name for Kleefeld.  (Kleefeld had originally been named Gruenfeld for a village near Borosenko Colony in Russia where a lot of the Kleine Gemeinde had lived.  But its mail often got sent to another village named Grenfell, so the postmaster renamed it for his home village of Kleefeld in Russia.)  They ate dinner at the Heinrich R. Duecks.  His wife, Elisabeth (Brandt) was Cornelius’ second cousin.  Then they went to Dr. Kroeker to get the boys’ eyes treated for trachoma – something that they could afford now that Cornelius had married a wife with money.

Then they went visiting in Steinbach.  I am not sure who the Widow Johann Reimer and Johann W. Reimers were.  Klaas K. Friesen’s first wife had been Maria J. K. Plett, who was the older sister of Cornelius’ first wife Katie.  And then they went to David K. Siemens, Cornelius’ older brother, for night.  One of the reasons that Cornelius and Margaret had returned to Manitoba after they got married was for Margaret to meet Cornelius’ relatives, and now she was on a whirlwind tour of visiting them.