Oral History Interview with Davis Dixon & Susie Dixon

Shurtz: This is July 1st, 2008, my name is Clinton Shurtz, it is…one-fifty, I’m in…Fulton, but, in Hickman County, talking to Davis Dixon about his experiences in World War II. Thanks Davis, for talking to—with me, and…I guess to begin with, tell me about…where you grew up, and a little bit about your childhood… Dixon: Mm-mm.

Shurtz: …your parents and… Dixon: I grew up in a community called Beelerton at one time was called Needmore…as I grew up it was called Beelerton. It is about six or eight miles off, from where I now live in Hickman County. That’s where I left to…to go in the service. I was born in a community on the other side of the county called Shiloh Community, where my father and mother were both schoolteachers at a rural school. 1:00And I left…Beelerton to go in the army, and it was I believe February the 16th, nineteen-and-forty-five, and I served—a kind of an unusual situation, I served twenty-two months in the service, and was discharged the 16th of December, so it turned out to be exactly twenty-two months that I served in the service, which was, I, I was very fortunate, I took my training in Camp Fannin, Texas and from there I was home for a short leave and left, was shipped out to go overseas, from California and I believe it was July or August, or early August, landed in the Philippines on September the 2nd, 2:001945, the day the war was officially over. It was a very good experience and that the war was over, but a very sad experience to see what had happened during the war, and see the after affects of the war was not pleasant (Emotional sounding voice) and a sight that I don’t like to think about. (Resumes normal voice) I served in…I was, well I took basic training in the infantry in Camp Fannin, Texas and when I w…arrived overseas, I, and the war was over, and I was assigned to the 6th Medical Battalion, and the 6th Medical Battalion operated 3:00independently and had its own facilities so far as…mess halls, doctors that operated the first aid station. We formed the 6th Medical Battalion or I was attached to the 6th Medical Battalion while we were in the Philippines, and I stayed there about a month, and then I was shipped to Korea. I was in the first—so I was told—the first group of Americans that landed in Korea after World War II was over. The Japanese still occupied the country at the time we arrived, and we were given very crude maps, and our…6th Medical Battalion, about a hundred strong, 4:00was told to go to a city called Quang Ju and at Quang Ju…we were told to locate a certain area in the city of Quang Ju and when we found it, it was a masonry-constructed building two-story, and the Japanese still occupied it, although they couldn’t speak in our language and we couldn’t speak theirs, they somehow knew we were coming and they, in this two-story building for about a week, they slept upstairs and we slept downstairs, and they were friendly, and…after about…a week, why they left and were sent back to Japan. And I was in Korea at Quang Ju and then another city 5:00called Suncheon for…approximately a year before, a little over a year before I was sent back home.

Shurtz: And how old were you when you joined?

Dixon: I was…eighteen, I was drafted when I wa…I was 18 December the 2nd, 1944, and I was drafted just after I was 18, in February of ’45. I had just finished high school, I finished high school when I was 17 years old and then when December 2nd rolled around, why I registered for service, and then they drafted me and I was inducted into service in…in February of ’45. Then I was in service from, 6:00from…that time until February the 16th, until December the 16th the following year, which is twenty-two months exactly.

Shurtz: Hum. Can you describe some of your, your duties and, and… Dixon: When I was in Korea, I was first assigned as an ambulance driver and…and an unusual find, they gave me an assistant driver who had never driven a vehicle. I well remember he was from Minnesota, a real good kid…and…although the war was over, we still had quite a few duties to perform with our…med…little medical battalion, and…so it was, it was an interesting experience. Me, I had driven all of my life, virtually, 7:00at that time, and to train him in those ambulances that we had that day were stick shift and…were in fairly good shape, and after driving an ambulance for a while, why the…man who had been motor sergeant for this battalion, his turn came, he had seen action, and his time came for him to go home, and I was made motor sergeant and in charge of…the ambulance part of the 6th Medical Battalion which included, I, I don’t recall later ten ambulances, and keeping them running was a pretty good chore, the roads over there were very, very bad and keeping tires and springs was one of the major problems we had. We did do some ser…work for when called on, 8:00we did some work for the…civilian population, and being in a medical battalion, why we became friends with some of the Korean doctors and that was an interesting experience to mix with them somewhat socially. We had a, they were, we were invited, a few of us were invited, to have meals and, in the homes of some of the doctors, when you sat on the floors that it was their custom and their buildings at that time were heated from underneath the floor on one side of the house you would fire a, they would burn wood or char…or charcoal. The other side of the house would be a chimney and the way they heated the house from, I was there during the winter months—why it, it, it 9:00was nice and warm, and it was their custom to sit on the floor and I think most of the time, those poor people slept on the floor, which to me was something, and it was an interesting, very interesting situation. So I, I…I look on my experiences as—being in the service—as a, at a very young age, as a very lightning ex…experience—enlightening experience, and…really, since I did not really have any physical harm, why I suppose it, it might be good for me, and when I came back out of the service, why I had the GI Bill, and I used that then 10:00to go to college at Murray and to get a degree in ag, which would have been a, I, I could have done it, but, and had made some plans on how I might manage to go to college, but my funds were very limited. I had lost my father when I was very young, seven, about seven years old, and so it would, it was…probably, but from that standpoint, was a good thing.

Susie Dixon: Did you tell him that you all vaccinated the, the children?

Dixon: Yes, I could mention… Susie Dixon: ( ).

Dixon: …one of the, we did do some work with, as I mentioned the Korean doctors, and…they made arrangements for us to…and it was clear through our…I suppose generals, 11:00whoever was in charge…above us, but we gave injections for different diseases to children. I, I don’t know what they were, I, things that we probably inject our children for now, when they’re young, but we were…we would give injections to huge numbers of kids at, at certain places where it was planned and all lined out and we, even though I was motor sergeant [Chuckling] well, actually, I guess I did that while I was a ambulance driver, but we all worked at it and all worked together regardless of what our title was, and the kids were mostly, well they’re small people anyhow, but they were mostly, I felt like 12:00underfed…and I, I well remember that when you would take a hold of the arm to give an injection to give the, why you had to do it just so-so, or you’d hit the, the bone in the arm.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: But they were appreciative of all we were doing, they knew it was good, and those that we had contact with were appreciative, at least. Yeah that was on a kind of an unusual thing. I think…I’ve always thought that, that our people, I’m talking about our soldiers, and all, when they were in other countries, they were friendly and looked up to, really were appreciated by the countries, 13:00by the people that were our, that lived in the countries where they occupied. It, it was certainly that way in Korea where I was. They were, the people were very nice, and…we…hadn’t had such things as, our diet was K-rations to a great extent for a good long while, we finally got mess hall set up and, and but even then it was very little meat, very little fresh meat, and, and, and…so we found out from communicating with the Koreans that, some of our people did, that, that you could sometimes find a, in the mountains, you could find wild hogs and, and other wild life, and, and we would…shoot that and some of the Koreans would even help 14:00us dress it, and…so we could have some fresh meat, which was a treat.

Shurtz: What kind of animals?

Dixon: Some wild hogs, and deer, and…oh… Susie Dixon: Caribou?

Dixon: Huh?

Susie Dixon: Caribou? Did you have Caribou here? That was… Dixon: No-no, we had…caribou, caribou in the Philippines and that was awful to eat, you could smell it cooking [Chuckles – Shurtz], and you know, we didn’t want to go out when they had—the nights we had caribou, which was pretty often. Why…it, it…now breakfast in the service overseas was pretty good by and large. It was…powdered eggs, but I was a poor boy raised in the country and used to eat scrambled eggs, and I didn’t think the powdered eggs was that bad. Sometimes you’d have a little cured meat, 15:00which you enjoyed very much so, and then, maybe they would cook the cured meat ( ) such a way that, that it was…flavored the eggs, and…so I, I did, I was not a coffee drinker, didn’t even like t…t…to smell the coffee, and of course that’s what they served, strong black coffee, which I did not like and I have since and later, since I became sixty-five years old, I started [Chuckling] to drinking coffee, but that [Laughing] that’s unusual, and I know it is, but…one kind of an interesting experience, I don’t know whether you would be interested in this or not, when we were shipped out of—to back up a little in the story about going overseas, to back up to about August of, of…of…’be 16:00’45, when we shipped out, out of California to go overseas, well we was, I was…among about eighteen-hundred others that I think all had taken infantry basic, that’s what everybody did then, and…there was about 1800 besides the crew on the ship, and they called them war…buckets was the terminology, in, in some circles, and…the things were about as, almost as wide as they were long, so they weren’t very stable, they were, they rocked around in the waters quite a bit…problems with upset stomachs was very common. But that didn’t last too awful long, and, 17:00of course after a while, you got—they, they, navy custom why you had beans for breakfast and a lot of the time. And I thought they were seasoned with sorghum molasses, but [Chuckling]…I may not be right, but they were pretty good, I could eat them. And…but they called for volunteers to work in the…butcher shop, and on this boat, they had a large area…what was the cold storage area, and they wanted somebody that had experience to work as helpers in the butcher shop, clean up and work otherwise in the butcher shop. Well this friend of mine who was raised on a farm and had 18:00been some experience with hog killings, which we had, of course I was somewhat familiar with, being raised on a farm, and…so we volunteered and thought we’d get some special treat for food, and we did. Well, they had sides of beef hanging up in this real cold storage area, not a lot of it, but quite a bit. They also had milk in cans, I would say were most of them were like about five gallons…they were OD colored, army colored, sealed up like a can of fruit or something, or a vegetable, I, I, but it was milk, we found out, and being big milk drinkers and raised on the farm where you had lots of milk to drink, and my buddy was the same way, 19:00why we really enjoyed our, our time working in the, we had a choice food, we made arrangements to get some of the meat cooked to our way of liking, and…by some of the sailors that was down there, and, and…and had sweet milk to drink, and oh that was real sweet. So, that was just kind of an interesting thing I don’t know whether that’d make any folk… Shurtz: Yeah sounds good.

Dixon: Huh?

Shurtz: I said that’s fine, yeah.

Dixon: I enjoyed it. He and I and I can’t even…I just met him on the boat, and I don’t remember his name now, and I, I kn…I had met him and found out that he had experience on the farm. Of course, in those days, a lot of the people that went in the army were farm boys. This country was primarily agricultural-related country, 20:00and…so it wa’n’t unusual to meet a farm boy, although I met some people from Louisville after I landed in the Philippines and in Korea, and I met s…a fellow by the name of (Bennett?) but I…can’t rememb…Robert, I believe was his first name. I tried to locate him a few years ago and couldn’t locate him. I remember his daddy was a, a professor in one of the colleges in, in Louisville, and then he had a friend, and I can’t recall his name, but…I met people from, from cities, but by and large I, of course knew a lot of people—had more in common with people that were from rural areas. All I could, I don’t guess it makes any—I go on and on and talk but I, I look back 21:00on my experience as a…of being in the service, and, and…I’d, I’m, I’m not unhappy about it. It, as I said, it probably was good for me in different ways, but I think about the, the wars and, and what they mean, and why do we have to have them?

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: (Sighs) I (Clears throat), Germany invaded Poland in September 22:00of ’39, and it was September of ’45, September the 2nd, I believe was the official day for the war to be over, in…in forty-five, six years, six years (Sighs). I’ve got, I get emotional too easy (Emotional sounding voice) I hadn’t always been this way, but… Shurtz: Oh don’t, don’t worry about it.

Dixon: …but I do. I’m a… 23:00Shurtz: A lot of veterans do.

Dixon: Huh?

Shurtz: I said a lot of veterans do, a lot of people I talk to, as it brings up a lot of emotions.

Dixon: Is that right?

Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: I am (Resumes near-normal voice) very much a family man. I’ve got five great grandsons, Susie and I, five great grandsons. I hope they don’t have to go through anything like that.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: (Resumes normal voice) Well you think back, and of course I don’t, I’m not a very good historian 24:00and, but when you think back as to what starts wars is that just a few people that are responsible for the wars and why does it have to be that way? Of course we’ll say Hitler, and Mussolini, then Hirohito from Japan, they are three that you think of, first of, I think of, and but they attract a following, and I th…I think it’s, why does it have to be that way? I s…I, I, it just shouldn’t have to be, but… Susie Dixon: Well, we got this man in Iran now that… Dixon: Yeah. 25:00Susie Dixon: …everybody, or a lot of people think that… Dixon: Yeah, yeah.

Susie Dixon: …that might end up fighting Iran.

Dixon: Yeah, it’s a… Susie Dixon: And I, and most people say that the people in Iran, the majority, don’t believe in what he is…promoting.

Dixon: Somehow or other these leaders whip up enthusiasm, and they get the people to believe in as they say they believe, and that’s, to me that’s where it all…and that’s…want power.

Shurtz: What do you think about…our presence in, in Iraq and Afghanistan? Is, do you think that’s justifiable, or should we be, be out of there?

Dixon: Well, when we went there, I thought maybe we was doing the right thing, 26:00but it didn’t turn out, I don’t think, like our leaders thought it would turn out, and certainly didn’t turn out like most of us average people, at least didn’t turn out like I thought it would, and…do I, do I think we gained (back?) long term? Right now I would say we pro…probably would have been better off if we hadn’t gone. Now I know there are people that disagree with that, but I, I think that, if a different approach had been used, and then think about, think back, of course they tried different approaches, so the history books tell us, and I am not, as I said, a very good historian. 27:00But they tried different approaches with…Hitler, Mussolini, and…why, why, look why couldn’t that have been avoided? So, now should we pull up and just leave over there? I doubt if we need to just pull and leave real suddenly and come back. I, I, I doubt it. Different cultures, different kinds of people, is of course part of the problem. A few years ago we didn’t, we didn’t know what a Moslem was, and, and I still may not know, but we know their thinking and their faith, and they lifestyle is a lot different from ours, but it does look 28:00like somehow that the people could learn to get along better and not have to kill one another off.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: Now, I guess maybe I’m…sentimental, maybe it’s going always—the bible says there’s wars and there will be rumors of wars, so. But I’d like to think it won’t always be that bad but, but I, as I said, I’ve got five… Shurtz: Hum.

Susie Dixon: Several ( )… Dixon: Three of them… Susie Dixon: …several years ago we helped pastored our church in Clinton, we do go to church in Clinton, Methodist Church, and the pastor said that he thought that we need to be more keenly aware of the Moslems in our country, and he had invited some Moslems who…were 29:00residents of Nashville, Tennessee to come and speak to some of us. Actually it was just a few that wanted to come and listen to them. And we gathered in the basement of the church which we have a good fellowship hall now, but at that time the basement was used for fellowship hall, and that was the first time I had ever met anybody that was supposedly a Moslem. I can’t remember now, there were four or five of them. I never felt any colder when those people left, it just, it was almost frightening. You could just see the hate in their eyes, and I thought, why are you here? You know. And he, at that time I hadn’t even thought about it, but he made me keenly aware that these people were making it into our presence here in this country and indoctrinating 30:00our people, the people that are in prison are not in there for being good people, it might be some of them in there that are good and got in there…convicted wrongly, but I, I’m afraid we, we don’t really. And I don’t hate Moslems, I think there’re some good Moslems, but I think that your age, these kids that we’re talking about, I don’t know what we face. I don’t know whether that can be overcome or not.

Dixon: Well, of course, you know what happened on Nine Eleven, and…the bombing and airplanes all, in New York. So, there is people that don’t like us 31:00and I don’t, you know, I don’t dislike them that much if they just leave me alone. Why do they dislike us?

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: Well, they s…they say, the Koran’s, I, they say does not teach hate, and does not teach some of the things that they are.

Susie Dixon: The radical version.

Dixon: Yeah, they’re doing, and certainly the bible that I read doesn’t—I mean it gives examples of wars and bad things that happened back many years ago, but it, it does so just to, from a standpoint of history, is the way I look at it, not as a way to promote it.

Shurtz: Yeah, it’s very interesting…a lot of the World War II veterans I’ve been talking to, 32:00I, I’ve been discussing issues in Iraq, you know, and…and most of them had the same opinion you just, you stated, you know, which is…I was expecting…all out support, you know… Dixon: Mm-mm.

Shurtz: …say, you know, and, and I have not seen that at all.

Dixon: Mm-mm.

Shurtz: Maybe one case, one person, you know, said we should be there, I think everyone else has, said No [Chuckles – Shurtz].

Dixon: Well, as I said, I th…I thought when we d…was doing it that we did the right thing.

Susie Dixon: Well the decision was made and whether those people really believed we ought to go or not, our leaders, it was made, but it’s a terrible shame that that’s one of many horrible mistakes that were made because of misinformation. Maybe they just, they wanted to go, they felt maybe… Dixon: Yeah, it… Susie Dixon: …it would be a feather in their cap to take Sadam Hussein out. 33:00I don’t know?

Dixon: If… Susie Dixon: I don’t know what they thought.

Dixon: Yeah. If our leaders, and I, when we elect a leader then I, I try hard to support him once he is elected, even whether I voted for him or not, thinking that the majority elected him, and, and he has m…information available that we don’t have, at least should have, and if they use it without bias, then, and I hope that they do, but unfortunately sometimes that’s not the case… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …and, and, and I don’t know whether any of them…thought that they had gained some way by us going over there themselves, 34:00rather than for the general populous there and here. So I, I don’t, I, I think, I think we did wrong? Yes. I don’t, I pray and hope that our leaders didn’t think it was wrong when they… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …sold the country into doing it.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: If George Bush, the present George, if George Bush did it because of retaliation, because they did try to kill his daddy when he was president, that’s bad.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Susie Dixon: But on the other hand, our news media, 35:00at least some of the news media, they take every opportunity they can to hit the Bush administration, George Bush, what do you think that looks like to people overseas?

Dixon: Well, maybe they think they did wrong.

Susie Dixon: And, and, and, and should they be over just little whole petty things, should they be delivering that kind of information to the American public, or should you and I make up our mind what we think about what they’ve done? I think you, you…well [Chuckling] Obama didn’t want to stop in Kentucky, we weren’t worthy of him putting his feet in our state [Chuckles – Shurtz]. Well, I’m sorry, hum…Kentucky is not that backward [Chuckling], and if it was, maybe they, it’d need some help from somebody, from… 36:00Dixon: Yeah, you know I always, I thought that was such a shame, and I tell them, I, when I was in the army I’d tell him where I was from. Yeah, you’re from Kentucky where they make whisky [Laughter – Shurtz]. You all got bootleg down there? Things like that, and… Susie Dixon: We have a lot of good things… Shurtz: ( ).

Susie Dixon: …that have come out of Kentucky, I’m proud of that.

Dixon: Well we, now see she is bragging on Kentucky, but I found her in Tennessee.

Shurtz: Ah!

Dixon: She is just about six or eight miles over there, but sh…I found [Laughing] her in Tennessee. We’re, we’re farmers or, as, as you know, I guess you knew it, and…part of our farm is, ( ) farm land is in Tennessee.

Shurtz: Oh!

Dixon: Now it’s not contiguous, we, we ha…we own seven different farms, different, scattered around, 37:00some of them pretty good size, and one in Tennessee where she was raised, we—she inherited part of it and then we bought most of it from people that got older and died and moved away, and…so she was raised on the Tennessee side of the state-line. You go that way just three or four miles and, and you’re in… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …Tennessee, and I was raised over on this side of the state line, about six miles, five or six miles north of here, where I was raised. There’s an unusual situation when you go from Fulton to Dukedom, Fulton is a, you know, tw…twin cities they call it… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …and Dukedom is on the line, actually a little bitty place of Dukedom, part of it in Tennessee 38:00and part of it in Kentucky. But you drive out so far from Fulton, I forget, about four miles, I guess, three or four, and you can go through five counties and two states in one-point-one miles by zigzagging down the road, and there’s signs along the road that tell you when you’re leaving one county and leaving, and moving in the other one.

Susie Dixon: But you’d have to drive down the middle of the road to be in all of them see at one time.

Dixon: Yeah. Say you’ve got, in the Tennessee side you’ve got Obion County, and Weakly County, and on the Kentucky side, you’ve got Fulton County and Hickman County, and Graves County, and what I want to tell some, impress somebody, which I don’t really want to do, but I could if I’d say, yeah, we own land in two states 39:00and four counties, and we do, but it’s not all that big a deal, because it’s all… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …close by.

Shurtz: And this part of Kentucky’s, I was thinking when I come here, like this feels more like home to me being from southern Illinois, it seems like the same sort of territory. Now in Bowling Green, I feel like I’m in Kentucky… Dixon: Well it is!

Shurtz: …there is a different thing going on, you know.

Dixon: It is! You’re exactly right, and, and I, when we lived in southern Illinois, it was more like liv…living at home, particularly Marion, now we got to Olney it was a little bit more northern.

Shurtz: Mm-mm, yeah.

Dixon: But…yeah, in Olney, and of course, as political parties go and, and they’re mixed up a lot more now than they used to be…it seems to me they are, but when we lived in Olney there was very, very few people that said they were democrats. 40:00Everybody was republican, and I would teasingly tell some of them, I’d say, are you a democrat? I said why I, I lived in a county where they didn’t let republicans spend the night [Laughter – Shurtz and Dixon]. Well, that wasn’t exactly true but it made a good joke. But we didn’t have but three or four families that were republicans in Hickman County, and… Shurtz: I don’t think I’ve talked to republicans so far.

Dixon: Oh you hadn’t.

Shurtz: I don’t know, I’m… Dixon: Yeah. Well my grandson that lives here on, live right back here behind us, he and his wife are registered as republicans.

Shurtz: Oh.

Dixon: Now we all registered as democrats, the rest of us, but we vote republican a lot.

Susie Dixon: In the national election we vote republican.

Dixon: One reason we don’t change…is because local elections you’re left out at, at the, when, when you, you know, you can’t switch over.

Shurtz: Oh.

Dixon: And, 41:00and you can’t necessarily vote for the person you want to vote for.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: So, you have a lot more people running on democrats, you don’t have very many republicans running for local offices… Shurtz: I see.

Dixon: …because we got so many more democrats in the county, but we do have more republicans now in the county, than by far we used to have.

Susie Dixon: Lots and lots of people… Dixon: But… Susie Dixon: …vote republicans… Dixon: …but west Kentucky… Susie Dixon: …in the national election.

Dixon: …in particular, if you look and study the records, why west Kentucky in particular…I’d say in the, in the, in the national elections, probably vote just as many r…it just depends on the man—they, but there’re people not bashful talk about crossing over the line, if they don’t like a candidate, not at all, and, and I certainly wasn’t raised that way and a lot of—but now the younger ones, they’re more like (Kyle?) it’s my grandson…he 42:00wa…he, he, he said I di…but he is thinks George made a mistake too, and…and my son, which lives right there in that house, he…and he is, Kirk is fifty… Susie Dixon: Six.

Dixon: …fifty, yeah, fifty-six, he had a birthday just r…fifty-six years old, and, and, but he is, he is, he really thinks George made a bad mistake, he is really, he’s been against it almost from the beginning, and yet he voted for George Bush, I know he did. It’s going to be awful hard, I don’t, anybody that got nominated, almost, Obama or whatever, will probably got the votes in this country, instead 43:00of the r…it was on, on the democrat ticket would vote, would not vote for McCain.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: Because they think he is too much like George Bush, and, and I am not sure he is, and I haven’t made up my mind yet who, who I am going to vote for, but…I, I just can’t hardly trust Obama, I still wonder if there is not some of that Moslem blood in him [Chuckle – Susie Dixon], and I just… Susie Dixon: Well, that’s not what bothers me, it bothers me that for twenty years he sat in a church where a man was preaching hate against this country.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: Yeah that’s… Susie Dixon: Now that bothers me.

Dixon: Me too, and he stayed and I, I’m not going to vote for him.

Susie Dixon: I, I don’t say that he… Dixon: But I, I’m not sure McCain is…is the man for the job, but we got to vote for one or the other, and I hope he is, I mean, 44:00you know, McCain is seventy… Susie Dixon: Six, seventy-six, isn’t he?

Dixon: I believe he is seventy-six. I am eighty-one, and I, at seventy-six I didn’t need that job [Chuckles – Shurtz]. I mean I could run the farm then, but I’ve turned it over to my son since then, I don’t, he pretty well runs it, he and his two boys.

Shurtz: So when did you two meet?

Dixon: We met…I was going to school at Murray, and I was riding the bus on a weekend back to Murray, and she was going to a business school at Paris, Tennessee, and she rode the same bus, and I didn’t know her. And…the bus stopped on the state line and rode over there in front of her house and here comes this young lady to get on the bus, 45:00and…you know, I thought, you know, I kind of like her looks, and…that’s how we met. And after a while why I was going with one of her friends, so I arranged for a friend of mine to have, to have a blind date with her so I could get to know her a little bit better [Chuckle – Shurtz], and it wasn’t long until well, the next date was with me and that was in nineteen… Susie Dixon: About 1948.

Dixon: ’48, we got married in June of 1950.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: So, we’ve been together a long time.

Shurtz: I want to back up, you’re the first veteran I talked to that was in Korea. What exactly what, what were we doing in Korea? What was the… Dixon: Well, the…Korea, the Japanese had took 46:00over Korea and, and…had, those people had just become slaves so-to-speak, and I don’t th…I don’t think there was any fighting actually done in Korea, like there was, we did fight some Japanese, I understand, in China, but, but they had actually took over the Japanese in Korea. I noticed in a paper recently where some leader, one of the leaders thought political leaders in Korea had made history by visiting Japan, they hadn’t forgive them all this time for what they did to them, and, and they s…they just took over that country and made slaves out of them so-to-speak.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: They…scrap, they needed metal, and they, 47:00I had been told, or heard about it, and I saw where they just cut bridges down and took them for the scrap, and that country went, I’m not sure how advanced it was, but it went backwards while the Japanese were there. They were just, just slaves for the Japanese, and… Susie Dixon: Well they had places up in the mountains where they had guns and places to live, the Japanese did.

Dixon: It was interesting to, to go up in the mountains where they had made…big caves back in the mountains, and some of it rock and pretty rough terrain, and, and had guns emplacements there, as if they was expecting us to attack them there, and had, even had rooms in the back in there where they could live, you could tell, and they, that, that country was…just took over by the Japanese. I… 48:00Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: …I don’t know how long before World War II that existed, but I think for a good while and then when World War II come along, why it, it, it got worse, they just, well they just took everything they wanted from them.

Shurtz: In right, at that time, was that a unified Korea? There was no north and south side… Dixon: Yeah, it was one of them—when we went there it was unified Korea.

Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: When I was there, all the time I was there it was unified Korea. I didn’t, see I was there before the Korean conflict.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: Yeah, it was unified Korea. I have a brother who has been to Korea, he is, he is a soil scientist at Texas A & M, and he’s done work all over the world in different countries, working with…different types of (salt?) and help increase productivity, and then a lot of research work, but 49:00he, he made a, some kind of a presentation at one of the universities in Korea, and this has been a few years ago, and he had a lot of pictures he brought back and showed me. They are really, I, I just couldn’t hardly imagine how modern they are, oh, they’re, they’re just as far ahead as we are.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: Now I mean those people are ingenious and, and have done well for themselves, but we helped them. If we hadn’t helped them, I mean the roads, when we were over, when I was there was awful! Just…were a lot worse than were here, old rock roads and the rock was and, where there was rock, and it was, well as I said, keeping tires and ambulance, keeping tires and springs on the ambulances was a big chore. We had them on order, a lot, I’d have maybe half the ambulances on deadline, 50:00because of not being able to get tires and, and…springs.

Susie Dixon: They have shown us film…of being over there and it’s interesting to me, I don’t think they ever showed us a picture, there’s a lot of Christians, but I don’t think they ever showed us a picture of a church, but they spoke of going to church, it would be like a, a…multi-story business building and in the city we have, and the church would be I don’t know one them, sh…they said it was up on the seventh or eighth floor of this big business building and that was where the church was.

Dixon: They… Susie Dixon: They got to an elevator and went up to… Dixon: Yeah, yeah they… Susie Dixon: …to church services.

Shurtz: Hum.

Susie Dixon: And a lot of them were English speaking and they were thoroughly welcomed, you know, but that struck me as kind of odd. I think, probably in most of our cities we would 51:00think it a little bit odd if we had church services on a… Dixon: They, they’ve become a, a metropolitan country, almost, I mean they are so modern, you know, I don’t, when I was there, they had these rice paddies made in, you’ve seen pictures where they had rice paddies made in the side of the mountains.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: Well I saw a lot of that, and, and they was raising rice that way, and catch the water way on up above and let it trickle down through there in the summer time and all they had a lots of hand labor, and I understand there was some parts of the world they still raise rice that way, I saw some pictures just recently. But the Korean people have come a long ways, and, and of course, the, the south Koreans, and that was b…I, what started the split between the south, the north and south Korea, I guess is whoever got to be leader in North Korea is the one that 52:00caused it to start, and he, he was ruled with an iron thu…iron fist and, and that…that’s bad, that’s what I was talking about earlier, is that a few that cause all these wars and doesn’t have to be, oh I don’t know, I hope not, but so far it has been.

Shurtz: What was the feeling, at that time about our allies being the Soviet Union? When, were we totally supportive of the Soviet Union then, or were we skeptical of… Dixon: We wer… Shurtz: …about how that was going to work out?

Dixon: …as far as I was concerned, we were skeptical but, but now really considered them bad enemies.

Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: We were—I would say skeptical…at that time, and we’ve, to me we’ve gone…back and forth, as far as the general populace is concerned. We’ve gone back and forth since World War II, 53:00periods of time and, and long periods of time when we considered them an enemy, or at least a possible enemy, and then there’s been times when for a while, why we would be almost friendly with them, we, we are, we, we can’t make up our mind, and… Susie Dixon: Maybe it’s that they can’t make up their mind [Laughing].

Dixon: Well, yeah, maybe so, maybe you’re right, maybe it’s that way, but don’t you feel that way about it, that, that, that, that it’s been some of both?

Shurtz: Yeah, it’s gone back and forth, yeah.

Dixon: Gone back and forth?

Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: And…well that’s better than war.

Shurtz: Mm-mm. One…one veteran I was talking to over in south Fulton, he…he was in a prisoner of war camp and he was rescued by soviet women in army tanks.

Dixon: Oh my!

Shurtz: He said…you know, these tanks came in and tore down the fences, and they opened up the hatches, 54:00and who are they? O…they took off their helmets and long hair appeared. They, they were big women [Laughter – Dixon].

Dixon: Yeah, yeah [Laughter – Shurtz and Susie Dixon].

Shurtz: They, they, I guess the United States was paying the soviets five dollars per soldier that they would get out of the prisoner of war camps, so… Dixon: Rescue?

Shurtz: …they, they were out there collecting money.

Dixon: Oh!

Shurtz: They made sure to tell them don’t go, go anywhere, stay here so that we can collect five dollars [Laughter – Dixon and Shurtz].

Dixon: Well, that’s interesting. Who was that in… Shurtz: James Legate.

Dixon: I’ve heard of him, but I don’t.

Susie Dixon: ( ).

Dixon: I don’t know him.

Susie Dixon: I’ve heard, I’ve heard the name too, but I don’t know him.

Dixon: How old is he?

Shurtz: Oh, he is… Dixon: He must be pretty old.

Shurtz: Upper eighties, I, I would say, I don’t… Dixon: I, I’ve heard that name but I don’t…Hum.

Shurtz: So tell me, I guess a little bit about…you got a degree in agriculture and, and tell me about…farm life and kids and something about your, your family 55:00and living here in...

Dixon: Well, well after s…after college, getting my degree in agriculture, I taught a vocational…adult farmer ag class in the county.

Susie Dixon: That was installed after World War II.

Dixon: Yeah, after, yeah.

Susie Dixon: the GI Bill and then they, they installed this so you could train other farmers.

Shurtz: Oh.

Dixon: And actually a lot of the far…I taught—the ones I taught were all veterans, they, they, they were, they was the only ones that qualified, and that was allowed to stay in the classes, but it was interesting in that I had gone in the army, they had all been in the war, been veterans of World War II, it was for veterans of World War II, and I was younger than most of them, just got out of college, 56:00and…so a lot of my students was actually older and had more practical experience on the farm than I did, which made it somewhat difficult but still it was a challenge and I kind of liked it. So I did that for about two years, I guess, and the program began to run out because of veterans, after, they had…the government sponsored it and they actually paid them so much a month to participate in the program. It wasn’t a lot but it was something to help them get started and get on their feet, and…so as the program ran out, why I was raised on a dairy farm, and…I just could see it running out, so I thought well, I started on the side, in addition to teaching these classes, 57:00which was night classes, why I started…farming a little on the side and aft—that happened until August of 1953, I decided to leave the farm and go to work for a farm equipment company. I could see that there wa’n’t enough potential there for me to raise a family and I had had one child, and she was expecting again, and so in August of 1953, one of my teachers, the head of the ag department at Murray, a man by the name of A. (Carmen?) called me and told me that…or wrote me and told me that he knew that I was thinking about leaving the farm and he had somebody wanting me to interview to work for him, and I, in fact he had two different 58:00people for me to interview. One of them was Southern Sates Co-op, and, and the other one was…the manager out of Saint Louis for Case Farm Equipment Company, and I interviewed both of them, and the one with Case Farm Equipment Company offered me a whole lot more money to work for them, and I thought it sounded more interesting. It did mean that I would have to leave this area, and…so, in August of nineteen and…fifty-three, I went to work for Case Company, Case Farm Comp…Company and worked for them for nineteen years and three months, I believe. I lived in Marion, Illinois for a while, and…three years, and then Olney, I covered a territory there. 59:00They called people that did my kind of work in the farm equipment company was, they were called blockmen, and you were pretty well in charge of, of several dealerships in each area as to sales and service, and credit, and I did that in Marion, and then I did it again in Olney, and then they asked me to come to Saint Louis and be sales manager over the Illinois part of the Case Company territory, which had a branch in Saint Louis, and I did that for a year or so, and didn’t like it. I was away from home a lot and had two young children, and, so I started politic and trying to figure out a way to get back home, and managed to get transferred down, about down here as a blockman again, and we were here for…a 60:00blockman for about twelve years, and in August—no in…in November of ’72, why I resigned from the Case Company to become a full time farmer. I’d started farming again on the side when I worked for Case Company, and, and…and all the, actually I resigned in August of, of ’72, but they k…they, they wanted me to stay with them. They offered me different things and, and I just, I was determined I was going to stay on the farm and become a full time farmer, and make a living farming, and, but they s…continued to send me my check every month for the rest of the year, 61:00and…and, and we had an incentive plan for the work that I did, and they even sent me that every month, that went on in my territory, but I still stayed with it, [Chuckling] I, I didn’t go back to work for them, I just, and, and since then I have been a full time farmer…that’s since…actually August of ’72…I, I’ve enjoyed it, a lot of hard work, I…I think I’ve contributed some to society, if I may be so vain as to say that…and…we’re one of the first farmers in this area that started promoting conservation 62:00tillage… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …and, and for a period of time, for several years, why, oh I would say for three or four-five years we, we, we…county agents and other people would ask my son and I, we worked at it together, to…and by the way, he has a degree in ag from UK…we put on programs…but we made slide pictures of our farming operation and field operations and all, because people wa’n’t used to farming without tillage, and we have a lot of land, most of our land hadn’t been tilled since we acquired it, and we’ve acquired the major portion of it since we had acquired some land before I left Case Company, but the major portion, and but that we acquired 63:00before I left Case Company, most of it still hasn’t had any deep tillage.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: And one thing that got me started and a thing that sticks in my mind, is when I was taking soils under an old man by the name of a…and, and that’s what he was referred to at school at Murray, as old man A. (Carmen). He was the head of the ag department…of, of principled person, not anybody impressive at all, about as, almost as round as he was tall, but he was quite a guy, hard worker, I’ve seen him stand up in a podium in front of a class and, and m…making a presentation and absolutely go to sleep, and then raise up and go right on. Now the reason he did that, because he’d been out to the college farm to be sure that the cows was milked 64:00and everything was took care of before we come to class. He was that dedicated, and he was, he was just a fine man. Well, he picked me out, he mentioned to me one time, and I don’t’ know why, but “Dixon, there is a book called ‘Plowmen’s Folly,’ I want you to read it.” Shurtz: ‘Plowmen’s Folly.’ Dixon: He was a good man, he was good to me, and I don’t know why, but… Susie Dixon: Well when you first started out no tilling, you know, [Chuckling] he seemed pretty wild to go out there and plant in last year’s residue, or you had a cover crop wheat and go out there when it was about that high, high… Dixon: Oh, it’s coming now… Susie Dixon: …and, and… Dixon: …everybody does it.

Susie Dixon: …planting it, but when we started it, 65:00it seemed crazy, almost to do it that way.

Dixon: There’s still some farmers who don’t do it… Susie Dixon: Yeah.

Dixon: …won’t do it, they do a little no-tilling beans, but they won’t plant corn that way.

Susie Dixon: They give awards every year for people that contribute to conservation, and Davis and Kirk were fortunate enough to be the first that ever got the governor’s award in Kentucky, they’ve always gone to coal mines and all that kind of thing, and they got a lot of recognition and some of that almost comes backs and bite you, because people become jealous, you know, because you got an award, and that wa’n’t the reason we was in it at all.

Shurtz: They’ve…the benefit to that is, is it to cut down on pesticide use? Is that one of the things it does?

Susie Dixon: No.

Shurtz: What does it… Dixon: Well, not necessarily pesticide. You use…it cut down on erosion.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: Several years ago, we used to travel 66:00a little, never have traveled as much as we’d like to, but, we went down to New Orleans and that, that was when we began to hear and more—hear more about exports of our grain crops. Well, you know, a lot of it goes to New Orleans, goes down the Mississippi River. There was a great whole big barge out there then, that thing was long as from here to the highway down there, it was just a huge outfit, it’s half as wide. Well, it’s setting out there rumbling, boom-boom-boom-boom-boom, we’d hear these big motors. Do you know what they’re doing? They’re pumping silt off of the bottom… Susie Dixon: On the Mississippi River.

Shurtz: Oh!

Dixon: …and let it go on out in the ocean… Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: …to keep the river from (dobbing?) up, and, and that’s what happens, and I remember 67:00the creeks that we’ve got in this area, which give trouble overflowing now, because they’ve been (dobbed?) up with silt that didn’t use to do that. And, you know, our soil in this part of the world, it’s, it’s, you know, a…that’s the life blood of, of socie…humanity, really, if you got to have to something to eat to live, and it all grows out of the ground one way or another. And if the top soil is gone, what’s down below is not going to grow much, and our soil in this area is mostly windblown, it was blown in by winds, it’s, it’s loess is the name of it, it’s light, it’s fluffy, it literally melts when you, when you leave it wide open, no cover, no roots, nothing to hold, it, it just melts and runs off… Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: …so 68:00since I was a kid working on the farm there, where I was raised, I noticed the ditches and things, and I would haul manure out of the barn with a fork and a mules, and a wagon, and s…and stick it in those ditches to (dob?) them up, because I knew that wa’n’t good.

Susie Dixon: ( ) he wanted to get grass growing.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: To get stuff to grow in there. So it’s just been always been a natural thing for me, I don’t know, it’s just that way, that just always concerned me.

Shurtz: Did you raise livestock too?

Dixon: We did, we don’t raise livestock anymore, we, we used to have cattle and hogs, and then we…got rid of the ca…we go s…we’re strictly whole crop farmers. We grow corn, wheat, and soybeans. For years we had a confinement hog operation here, in addition to that. But it got to where it wasn’t very profitable, and so 69:00we went to the other. We’ve done, we’ve been fairly successful at farming…our business…I serve on…local bank board, and they think enough of my business that they asked me to serve. In fact, I’ve got a bank board meeting to go to tonight, and…so we, we…we’ve done, we’re not rich, but we’ve done, we’ve made a good living for our, educated, I’ve got a daughter that’s, that’s retired from kindergarten teacher, in Clinton, in Hickman County and then Kirk, our son has never worked anywhere but one day somewhere else [Laughter – Dixon and Shurtz].

Susie Dixon: And he’s got two boys here.

Shurtz: Are they, are they keeping up the farming tradition?

Dixon: Yes.

Susie Dixon: Oh yeah.

Dixon: One of them. One of them was…when 70:00he was in school at Murray, he got involved in the Christian work and foreign mission Christian work, and, and he did that, he went to China for two years after he got out of college…he…after that he marri…he met a wo…young lady who was also that kind of work, she was in Paraguay, I believe, and…so they went to Nepal, you, you’re familiar with that… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: …little country, you know where it is.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: They’ve had a lot of uprisings over there in the last few years and they were there when their first child was born, although they didn’t stay there for the birth, they went to… Susie Dixon: Thailand.

Dixon: …Thailand for the birth, and…but while they were there, things got awful rough, 71:00and they were told they were misled, I think, they’ve never talked about it much, but they went with them and they went to Nepal, they were told another place where they would probably s…go eventually and…Chris is his ( ) first name, he, he went there and stayed there for…two or three days, and…it, it, it was terrible conditions, terrible conditions, I...

Susie Dixon: Well the tanks were running up and down the streets while they were there, and a good portion of the time, three weeks at a time, they were not allowed to leave their apartments, which had a wall around the building that apartment was in, and every three weeks they could go out and buy groceries.

Dixon: Their water supply was so bad that before they could bathe their baby in it, baby in it, you put iodine in the water 72:00and let it stay there so long, to make it pure enough to bathe the baby.

Shurtz: Whoa!

Dixon: So you know where they drank water? And it was pretty rough, and they decided that, and of course with internet like it is now, and computers, why we, even over there, they had some computers contact, and…they decided that—we needed Chris here on the farm, Kirk our son is, is, I’ve had serious back problems and surgery three times and he’s got two steel plates in his back and he, we…you’d think we ought to pick another business and [Chuckling] then require such hard work, but anyhow…we made it very plain that we like to have him 73:00back to the farm, and made it so attractive that, kept after him, but we agreed, or Kirk did, he’s pretty well in charge of everything now, but I agreed to it, that he works ten months out of the year on the farm and two months of the year, he goes to wherever he wants to go and does mission work… Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: …and, and, of course gets paid the year around, and…he…we’re wishing he wouldn’t go. Last winter, he went to...he was going to go to Mexico, there is a group called Christian Farmers of America that he was in contact with, that’s not the group he was con…he was with earlier but, he…somehow something happened down there and they have done some work in some areas 74:00in Mexico, as I understand it, they’re helping the people, teach them how to produce food that they eat, subsistence agriculture, but that fell through someway, so he went, then he got a, a, a group that…goes to Canada, they, there is a university in Canada c…called International School, and there’s students there from, and I think they said like there’s thirty or forty languages spoken on that campus. They specialize in foreign students, not that there is not Americans there, they, they’ve a lot of foreign students and…he [Chuckling] had, the way they get to them, he and his family went, they had an apartment there and they have to—this is expense on their part, to do this…they…[Chuckling] 75:00and he says it’s kind of like, they, they organize ball clubs at this university for young intramural ball games and stuff and those that join their team they agree that they will have…some type of bible studies ever so often, and…so many minutes out of the game or something, and he said it’s interesting to see a guy out there on the ball court with a turban on playing ball [Chuckles – Shurtz], but he said, we had some.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: And that Chris is twenty…eight, that’s… Susie Dixon: Yeah.

Dixon: He—oh, by the way, he, after going to…China, 76:00he came back and went to seminary in…s…North Carolina, finished seminary down there. His wife has a degree, has a finished seminary.

Susie Dixon: She is a registered nurse… Dixon: She… Susie Dixon: …and has a deg…a seminary degree.

Dixon: And she is registered nurse, she is not, she is not practicing nursing, but she is a registered nurse. She has done that, and they have two children, one is two and one one, and our other son, our other grandson, (Kyle?), who has a house right behind that house, you can’t see it, but it’s back there, and…he’s got a boy that’s one year old, about one year old, and his wife is a local girl…though we, we are a diverse bunch here, his wife is home schooled and, and Kirk’s wife is—I mean Chris’s wife 77:00is, I guess got an equivalent of a masters or a doctor’s or something, but, we, we all get along.

Shurtz: How many acres total do you own?

Dixon: Twenty-two hundred that we own.

Susie Dixon: You asked about pesticides a while ago.

Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Susie Dixon: They call all these chemicals pesticides, and to me that’s a little bit [Chuckling] deceptive too at the very best. But…how many years ago has it been since…the Tennessee Valley Authority…was the ones that sponsored this, they asked, see there were two farmers from the United States and one from Canada, they invited to come to, well they, supposedly meeting with people from Washington who were just really…trying their best to do away with a lot of our chemicals… Shurtz: Mm-mm.

Dixon: Par… Susie Dixon: and… Dixon: …particularly Atrazine Dixon: Yeah, particularly Atrazine, we were just poisoning 78:00the earth with this, according to them, and…anyhow we were one of the two farmers in, in the United States that was invited to go up there and actually met over in Maryland, and…all these people spoke, and [Chuckling] they, at this meeting that we had, of course we had this woman there that she headed up the environmental protection agency there, that she was just really irate about these chemicals and she said Atrazine in particular. Well it got later, and later, and later, and it was almost twelve and people were beginning to stir, you know, thinking that it was lunch time, and Davis still had to speak. I said, “Oh boy, you better say a few prayers for him because they may get up and walk out [Chuckles - Shurtz].” But I was proud of him. 79:00And he spoke to them about our family, how we were not in any sense of the word poisoning the ground, that it was the way we farmed and it saved the, the soil, and we used only tiny minute amounts of the chemical to kill the weeds, and you could have heard a pin drop, and I was just really proud of him, and I think since that time, or after that time, they did kind of quiet down about it, and you know, it just, you just wonder if you’re doing any good in this life, but I felt like he did a lot of good that day. I think he got to that red-headed woman up there [Chuckling] that thought she knew so much, but she really didn’t know.

Dixon: Well…to sum it up just until, when I got through I said, of course, you all were saying these things are harmful, 80:00but I can tell you for sure, if we don’t keep on using them, eventually malnutrition will be harmful.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: And that’s right.

Shurtz: Do you…or have you ever practiced saving your own seeds, has that ever been a… Dixon: Some, yeah, we due to the seed Monsanto, they’ve do genetic…have done a lot of work in, in breeding plants and have seeds that are, have certain genetic traits, and they’ve got them patented and you can’t save them.

Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: And… Shurtz: I was, I was getting to that, like what, what do you think about that? Is that a, is that a ( )?

Dixon: Why I, I think it’s, I…I think that some of that’s unfair, I think they’ve carried it too far. Yeah, I noticed in Wall Street Journal yesterday, 81:00or the day before yesterday one, that their profits was 41% higher than they were the previous quarter, and yet they plan on raising prices some more.

Shurtz: And especially, you know, if Monsanto seeds gets into your field, they own your see…you know, it’s like you, you know, they don’t… Dixon: We can sell it for, for consumption, but, but we buy seed that, that are produced by a Monsanto a Dekalb which we don’t buy much Dekalb seed, because we don’t like Monsanto Company, we, we avoid Monsanto Company all we can. We do business with—of course we do business with, with the local dealers, but we avoid Monsanto as much as we can avoid, and we ha…but this year we’re raising some seed for a company that is doing it for Monsanto.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: They grew the seed in Brazil 82:00last winter and brought them over here and we got them about, oh, two weeks ago or something, and they’re furnishing the seed and we have to sell them to this company who is doing it for Monsanto. I hesitated to do that, but they, they d…I don’t know. You want to, I mean as, as we go on, this earth is going to have to be protected for the benefit of, of the people and, and you’re going to have to produce some more, or, or people won’t have enough to eat, and, and, and I really, I, I, I’m glad that we got higher prices right now. Sure, we enjoy those high prices, but our overhead is terribly high too. In the end, I don’t know whether we’re going to have—we normally make a profit here, we’ve, we’ve never have but one or two years, but we do a lot of things 83:00that a lot of people don’t do. Some of it is, is hard, is, is just management and a lot of hard thinking and a lot of hard work, and, and we’ve got farmers that are bigger than we are in this area, and we appear more successful in some ways. But we feel pretty deep about protecting the earth and protecting, being able to produce for the benefit of all mankind. Now that’s just the way it is, it’s, I guess it’s like a fight with us, as we, we…we share that, Kirk and I, we all share that.

Susie Dixon: Well now this last year… Dixon: We bought a farm, a hundred—small farm, a hundred and twenty-four acres, in Fulton County, 84:00have you been to a community called Casey?

Shurtz: I’ve driven through, yeah.

Dixon: We got a farm down there, two hundred and twenty-four acres. We bought it for Kirk was the one that want to do it. I wa’n’t too much in favor of it. He went down there, we have a w…soil probe where you probe the ground and see how deep the soil is and all, and he’d kept telling me that farm has got a good type of soil, and it hadn’t been abused and it’s pretty, be pretty productive if it’s handle, he says some of the hill side is pretty thin but I think you, I think we can make it pay off and those people down there says they don’t take care of their soil like they ought to in those communities as they burn the wheat straw and do things like that. He said, I just believe it’d be good if we bought it. And…I, I drove, we drove and went down 85:00there the day of the sale, and had the sale at the Casey School. The auctioneer got up and all these maps, they had it divided up into lots trying to sell it to people to build houses on, and that type of thing, and it’s quite a coincidence, I had written down on a little piece of paper and put it in my pocket what I thought we could give for it, and the auction was going on and, and…his two boys was with us and it, the auction went on, and they sold it in lots, and they sold it in different pieces and four pieces at a time and different things. It had a house on it and we didn’t want any house and, and finally the auctioneer said he was going to have to stop the sale that one man had to go and talk to his banker, 86:00and…and he left. I saw the guy go out the door, and they played music, and they had entertainment and all that kind of thing, while he was gone, and telling people you all need to be looking at these different tracks and don’t miss a bargain and, the guy was gone for fifteen-twenty minutes and come back in and I saw him shake his head at the auctioneer, and I guess that meant he couldn’t bid anymore, and, and the auctioneer turned and looked at Kirk and [Chuckling] said you bought it [Laughter – Susie Dixon]. And I didn’t even know he’d bid! [Laughter – Shurtz and Susie Dixon]. But it was a same figure that I had in my pocket.

Shurtz: Hum.

Dixon: We’ve done a lot of hard work down there. He has, and his family, 87:00you buy these older farms that’s been allowed to grow up, and brush grow up, and the fence arose and all that and, and…it’s…it’s a lot of hard work to clean them up and get it, it really is, and it, you can do a lot of it with equipment, but who’s going to pick up the chalks, as an example, you know, equipment don’t pick them chalks up, you can’t farm with the big equipment, you know, we got a twenty-four-roll planter.

Susie Dixon: In other words, after you clear out those…trees and whatnot, you’ve got lots of little bitty junks, and great big junk, and you go out there and manually pick-up… Dixon: You pile it all up and burn it but you still got chalks. Well you’ve got to go pick them chalks up, and then you got to put them in a separate pile and burn them, or dig a hole and burry them, a lot of hour, we’ve done a lot… Susie Dixon: Chalking is a big [Chuckling]… Dixon: We’ve done a lot of it.

Susie Dixon: …ugly 88:00word around here.

Shurtz: Yeah I know why it’s a, I, I was raised in a farm, but I, my, my siblings are a lot older than me, so, when they were kids, they had to do all that ( ).

Dixon: Oh, you didn’t do it.

Shurtz: I got out of it, I, I was in ( ).

Dixon: What size farm do you come off of?

Shurtz: Oh that, it, it’s mostly…only five hundred acres of it, we got a lot of crops, but…we’re big swine producers.

Dixon: Hog, hog… Shurtz: ( ).

Dixon: I see.

Shurtz: Raise feeder pigs.

Dixon: Confinement—oh feeder pigs?

Shurtz: Yeah, yeah.

Dixon: We had confinement hogs buildings, we’ve tore them all down now, but we had a whole bunch of them almost all of them.

Shurtz: Yeah.

Dixon: A whole bunch of hog buildings, pretty good size buildings out there, we’ve produced quite a few hogs and hogs helped us profit wise for several years.

Shurtz: We had some, you know, we do corn, wheat, soybeans, but it was never, my dad had another job too, it was never a… Dixon: Oh, I see.

Shurtz: …our, our main cash income ( ).

Dixon: Well, since I quite Case Company, that’s been it, here and that’s, that August of…August of ’72, now them paying me the rest of that year helped a lot [Chuckles – Susie Dixon]. I, 89:00I well remember that, but…I don’t know, you get to be my age and Susie and I, we reminisce a lot, would we’ve, you know, what would we have done different, would we…I don’t know whether we would have done any of our life different or not, we’ve, we’ve made some mistakes, I guess, but I don’t, I’m not going to admit it very quick [Chuckles – Shurtz and Susie Dixon].

Shurtz: Well, thanks for talking to—with me, I’m not going to… Dixon: You’re welcome.

Shurtz: …I’m going to turn this off.

Dixon: I hope it does some good.

Shurtz: Oh I… “END OF INTERVIEW”