Do you think that our lives have been made easier over the years? Well according to my grandpa they have. I don’t think I can disagree though. The labor of working on a farm was much greater than it is today. Today it seems as though farming is just sitting in a tractor and the tractor can navigate itself for the most part. But I bet your wondering what they did that was so laborious back then.

When my grandfather Phil Langin was growing up he lived right here in Chase County where his dad began to farm. He first started farming with his dad in 1937 when he was at the age of 13. I asked him if he thinks that there is a change in what farming was then and what it is today. He said that he has seen a significant change in the farming. They didn’t grow as much corn as they do today due to the fact that corn needed a lot of water and now they can get that water from pivots. You never see anything horse drawn anymore that’s what we used to pick corn with and to pull the hay rack. But the tractors have pretty much took over the job of a horse.

I asked my grandpa about his life as a farmer, he said he really enjoyed it. He said he has been through the hard times and it only made him a stronger person. What he meant by the rough times were most likely when he growing up in the 1930’s and 40’s. the 1930’s were a very dry time. Then the depression hit in 1939 which was when he went to war. He did not arrive back to chase county until 1944. Where he started to farm once again, that is when his dad gave him the farm. In the 1940’s mostly hail was what hurt them. The hail insurance was so high that he couldn’t pay it some years. He had 3 straight years that totaled his crop. My dad was born on September 11th ,1955. My dad helped on the farm while he was in high school but when he came back from college in Kearney my grandpa was ready to retire. So my dad was basically running the farm when he was 23. My grandpa still worked on the farm but he moved into town.

That was my grandpas life as a farmer he enjoyed the many years that he did farm. He has had his share of accidents while farming. He built that farm from the bottom. He built a house that sits on 7 acres. Now that the Langin’s have quit farming alls we have is a house and the land it sits on. That pretty much sums up my grandpa’s life as a farmer.