MARSH, CHARLIE AND DELILLAH (SHEETS)

by Marguerite Marsh Long

Entry F277 from the History of Hooker County Nebraska
with permission of the Hooker County Historical Society

Charlie and Delillah (Sheets) Marsh 1928

Charlie Marsh was born June 22, 1871 and
passed away October 28, 1938. Delillah
Sheets was born May 1, 1871 and died March
1, 1946. They were united in marriage and
were blessed with nine children, one dying in
infancy. The couple lived in various places in
South Dakota, including Olerich where they
lived until May of 1913 when they moved
back to Nebraska. The family moved in a
covered wagon with a four-horse team and a
milk cow leading behind the wagon. My Dad
and Mother bought what was known as the
Bart Howe place for us. We lived twenty
miles north and one mile east of Mullen,
which was our trading town. We lived in a two
room sod house, 14'X20' and 14'X28'. The
smaller room was the kitchen, dining room
and my parents bedroom. The larger room
was a bedroom for the children and who ever
else happened to stay overnight. One winter
there were 15 for every meal. My mother had
two cast iron three-legged kettles, and ten
quart kettles in which she cooked the meals.
She baked 8 loaves of bread every other day,
raised a garden and canned a lot. I helped in
the house, garden, and fields. I learned to
milk when I was six and started mowing hay
with a three-horse team when I was 12. I was
so light that Dad tied a foot long railroad iron
on the bottom of my mower seat to lift the
weight of the machine off the horses' necks
so the top of their necks wouldn't get sores.

I went to school through the 8th grade at
District 66 in Cherry County. (Our three
children went to this same school, Gerald and
Verla through the 8th grade and Charlsie the
6th.) We all had a number of teachers from
various parts of Nebraska.

We picked up cowchips to burn and had to
carry water from a windmill 50 yards away for
cooking, washing clothes and bathing which
we did in a wash tub.

I came to Mullen to High School with my
brother George and sister, Phylis in the fall
of 1922. We stayed the first year in the
Grandma Lay house which was torn down
and a new house was built, which is now
owned by Kenneth Phipps, next to the old
Methodist Church, now the Assembly of God.
The second year we stayed in the Floyd Kime
house, now owned by Robert Rogers. Phylis
quit the second year. George, who had taken
the 9th and 10th grades is District 66 in the
country, graduated in 1924. I spent the 11th
and 12th grades with the Todds, who lived in
the Joe Ulrick house which now belongs to
Paul and Elmer Little. I graduated in 1926
and married Floyd Long in the fall of 1926.

My parents, Charlie and Delillah were
buried close by Charlie's mother and step-
father, Rev. George Damon in the Dry Valley
Cemetery.