Grandma Rosie

For Women’s History Month I am remembering the women who shaped my life. My grandma, Rosalie (Gage) Majerus, was the oldest of eight children. She is pictured here with my dad on the right, Uncle John on the left, and the ubiquitous Tiger Lilies behind them.

My parents always said that her dad needed help on the farm and it wasn’t until child #6 that he got a son that survived infancy, so he treated Grandma like a son, and she worked hard on the farm with her dad. She grew up here in the driftless region of Minnesota in Trout Valley on a traditional homestead farm with cattle, chickens, horses, and hogs, growing hay and lots of their own produce.

She was a teenager and young adult during the Great Depression, and it left an imprint on her through the values of hard work, self-sufficiency, and nothing going to waste.

By the time I was born, Grandma Rosie and Grandpa Greg had established a turkey farm, but still had a few cattle, hogs, and a big garden. My parents built a house on the farm too, and I grew up seeing Grandma and Grandpa all the time until we moved when I was around age 10. My Uncle John and his family also ended up living on the farm, and I have the most wonderful memories of growing up there, playing outside for hours with my sister Michelle and cousin Nicole.

Grandma seemed to run the whole operation. I think part of the reason I love the picture shown here is that I don’t know if I ever saw her in a skirt! She wore pants, and bossed around all the men. She was hard and soft. She was an Iron Butterfly. She loved her granddaughters so much, and I know other young women in the area looked up to her.

She worried about us kids wandering off into the cornfield and getting lost, and she worried about us running around outside if the cows got out, fearing we might get kicked. She had a big vegetable garden, and loved gladiolus. She also loved hummingbirds and when there weren’t flowers for them, she fed them. She had a little weiner dog which my sister named Cindy Anne after her favorite doll.

Storms always scared her, I’m not sure if she ever encountered tornadoes growing up, but probably saw farm destruction from weather events. When I was little we had straight line winds on the farm which took the roof right off the turkey barn, and demolished it. Luckily we were all safe in my parent’s house, and Grandma rebuilt.

Back then of course there was no internet, but Grandma and Grandpa were interested in all things homesteading, and subscribed to various magazines to learn and try new things. They were featured in the Post Bulletin when they built a farm structure into the earth for efficiency, the earth insulating and keeping it cooler in summer and warmer in winter. It was the Egg-Room, where we processed and stored the turkey eggs, and we spent many hours there in the summer. In the winter we would sled off the sloped ground-covered back of the Egg-Room.

Grandma left us too soon in 1995. She smoked like a chimney back when doctors smoked in the hospitals and people smoked on airplanes, and just about everywhere else. My maternal grandma died before I was born, and although I often feel like I know her through all the stories my mom has told, Grandma Rosie was the only living grandma I ever knew, and I loved her so much. She is a part of me, she is in my DNA and I feel her presence often. I hope she can see me now returning a little bit to my roots. Her skin was deep brown from working outside so much, and although I am sure I wear more sunscreen than she ever did, the age spots on my forearms that pop out in the sun remind me fondly now of her. I will plant Gladiolus again this year for you Grandma. Thank you for being a strong woman in my life.