The Farm Series Collection

Fred was a farmer and lifetime resident of Bethel. He had a particular affinity for his oxen, and used them often for farm work and logging.

FD: Well, oxen go back in my family, I don't know how many generations, I don't know, my father had them, my grandfather had them, and I've had them, I grew up with them. 

Probably the first pair I had, I was around twelve, or thirteen years old, that I trained from the beginning right straight through. And, well, oxen are not any more of a job to train than a horse, it just takes a little patience, and common sense. And if you begin to get up tight, just quit, it's the same with them, it's just with human beings, if you begin to get uptight just walk away and leave them. 

Each animal like I said is different, and you have to do a little different along the line to train this animal. The main thing is being firm with them, but still getting them to explain, understand what you want. You can't, you can't lose your temper, you can't go overboard, cause like I said before if you begin to get uptight, leave them alone. You'll do them more harm than you'll do them good. A kind word and a pat on the back will go a lot further than a lot of other things.

All the field work, all the farm work, we used them in logging, it was, well they was used quite extensively in logging because they're not as nervous a disposition as a horse. And if you get into some little situation, where the horse might get nervous, an ox don't get very nervous. He's better in snow than a horse for this reason. Because he won't get thrashing around to tire himself out. He just plods along, he got that spade and that's all there is to it.

--Do you think it's a good thing that people are using tractors now?

FD: Yes, I do up to a point. I don't think a lot of these people are using tractors and making the money that I made with my teams. Because they're not getting that much more production and a lot more expense. But we had a certain amount of abuse, with different ones that had teams. Didn't understand the animals overworked them, didn't feed them too good and one thing or another, and we had a certain amount of abuse. So, that iron mule, you go out here, and you look around the different farms, and you'll see even they abuse them too. They don't grease them, they well run them into trees, and the like, they look like they've been through the Battle of the Bulge. It's the same thing with our automobiles. How many people you see have an automobile that isn't a year old, but it's, it's squeezed on both sides like an accordion. All the difference is that automobile don't feel it like an animal does.