From Elsie Burton’s diary
We went to the “Toe-hills”(foothills) one summer. Father had a harvester and hired his equipment and crew out to harvest farmers’ wheat chops. Our temporary home was a structure on sleds (a cookhouse). Within it was a stove and the rest of the space was more or less wall-to-wall beds for there were youngsters to accommodate by this time, my brothers Clem, Floyd and baby Darrell and me.
The structure was located on a stream and we children delighted in watching frogs during the day but did not much like the loud croaking they made at night. Occasionally, we were frightened by loud human-like screams during the night. Our parents flossed it over as nothing at all.
In my Dad’s crew were an older nephew or two who were with the family sometimes after working hours. One was overheard talking about the painful cries of the unwary frogs who were being eaten by the water snakes at night. Thus, I learned another lesson in nature. I had so liked to watch the frogs hopping about by day. It was a hard pill to swallow to realize that could happen to them and that no one was going to even try to do anything about it.
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