Notes for: Margaret Ellen McDONALD

Family History by Doris Fosket

After moving to Nebraska, Margaret finished her schooling and began teaching. To teach it was necessary to pass a "teaching exam" of the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic. At 16 she had her first school and loved it. There were seven pupils and she stayed with a widow and her four children. The school ran out of money and 2nd term she went to a school west of Hemingford. That summer she went back to Chadron for more classes. The fall of 1920, Margaret went to teach in Sioux County, Neb and stayed at the home of the Henderson's. There were several boys in the family, one she taught and one who was 18. On St Patrick's Day 1921 she went with Dale Henderson to a dance held in one of the ranch houses. There she met John Francis Fosket, 22, and that started their romance. He was living at home and knew Dale because another Henderson brother was married to his stepsister. Between March and November, John courted Margaret, riding horseback over to see her.

On Thanksgiving morning, Nov 24, 1921, before Mass, Margaret and John were married in the Holy Rosary Church in Alliance. Her brother Francis and sister Peg were their attendants. They took the train to Scottsbluff for a honeymoon and stayed in a big hotel there.

The first year of their married life they rented a house. Margaret continued to teach and John had a good crop of wheat and corn. The next year they moved into a sod house 1.5m west and 1m south of Berea, Nebraska. On Feb 5, 1923, their first son James Byron was born with Dr Black in attendance and her mother to help her. In 1925 they move to a farm 5m west and 1.5 miles north of Hemingford and here Doris May was born with a midwife in attendance on Apr 12, 1925. Margaret was medicated with chloroform for both births.

It was while living here, Margaret first had to take one of her children to the doctor. Doris was a baby and Jim about 2.5 years. She was cleaning the separator. To test it, Jim put his finger between the gears and turned the crank, wedging his finger in. Unable to turn it backwards or get it out, she had to leave him there and run to the field for help from John. She wrapped the mangled finger and took him to the doctor the next day. The end had to be cut off but some of the nail remained.

In 1928 the family moved to Sioux County, near Curly, to the Henderson place where they continued to farm and ranch. In 1928 before starting school, Jim had his tonsils out and nurses were future sister-in-laws, Gertrude and Catherine. Margaret began to wonder if she would have anymore children but on Jan 2, 1930 William Emmett was born in hospital in Alliance where she felt more secure.

Many of the years in Sioux County were hard years with no rain and the depression. Potatoes, field corn and bread and butter were their main diet, except for breakfast. She always had a spice cake made and they had oatmeal with cream.

In 1931 John had a 1/4 section of good grass ready for hay. It was cut and windrowed, ready to be stacked and a wind came up and blew it away. It was the beginnning of the dustbowl. Right after that, Margaret Regina was born at John's parent;s home in Hemingford on Oct 31, 1931. While Margaret was in Alliance with the baby, Doris stayed with Frances and Catherine because she had measles and scarlet fever. Uncle Grove Fosket took care of Jim and the house. He was a wonderful kind old bachelor man and a good cook. Emett's wife Trude took care of Bill for 2 months. He was not quite two and crazy about her and not too happy to go home.

One day when Bill was not quite two years old, Margaret prepared lunch and picked him up and put him in his high chair. She noticed that his nose looked red and swollen on one side. She discovered that he had put a bead in it. They hastily donned coats and drove seven or eight miles to her brother Francis's home and his wife Catherine removed it quickly and efficiently with a fine wire hairpin to her relief as she had nothing like that.

There were always a lot of cows to milk. While living on the Morgan place, on Jim's birthday in Feb, John and son Jim went out to milk in bitter cold. When they returned and he took off his glove, John's thumb was frozen solid, hard like ice. He thawed it out in snow and didn't lose it. Bill also almost lost a finger. When he was 5 or 6 he and Jim were playing with a jacked up model T without wheels and it fell on his hand. While Margaret was gone one day in 1934, while they were living on the Morgan place, Jim, Bill and their cousins Alvin and Bud, fixed dinner of roasting ears and potatoes.

John had a 1930 Model A and his brother George a 1928. When their uncle Tom died in 1934 in Sturgis and they wanted to go, they jacked up both cars and took the tires off George's to put on John's. George's tires were better but John's car was in better shape. They left in the evening and drove all night for the funeral the next morning. That night they drove back about 200 miles.

Three years passed after Jeanne was born before the Foskets had another baby, Elizabeth Alice. In Nov of 1934, Margaret's father died and on Feb 3, 1935, Betty was born.

When Doris was 11 or 12, she took the younger kids for a car ride - without permission. The back tire got caught in a cattle gate and she had to get a neighbor to help get it out. Otherwise her father might never have known!

Each time his wife would go away to have a baby, John would get Doris to help and they'd clean the house good for her before her return with the new baby. The family celebrated Christmas Day 1937 with Grandma and Grandpa McDonald While visiting in the parlor, Margaret told John she thought she'd better go to the hospital and Elnor Ann was born that day.

In 1938 they moved to Good Streak precinct, 14 miles north of Bayard. One day in August, Bill and Jeanne were playing in the barn and someway she caught her hand on a sharp wire hook and almost tore the ring finger of her left hand off. As John was working in a hayfield 25 miles away, Bill rode "Buck" the saddle horse over to the neighbors about 2 miles away and Mrs Green who was a nurse and her son Wesley came right over and took her to Dr Puggsley who took care of it. No ill effects resulted from the accident.

While living on the Marquard place, they had a good year. There was a pretty good crop and they raised calves. They worked and hauled in the corn, shucked it, bound it with a corn binder and ground it all for feed. Thery got a good price for the cattle then. During her last pregnancy in 1943, Margaret helped get the family back on their feet financially after practically going broke in Sioux County. She raised 500 leg-horn hens. She gathered the eggs in 5 gall buckets then sold them. Later she cleaned and sorted the chickens and sent them to DEnver.

In 1942 Jim joined the Air Force. He had been working the graveyard shift at the sugar factory at Bayard and decided to enlist while cleaning up a raw mess of syrup from the floor. 1943 was a big year for the Foskets. On Jun 29, 1943 Joyce Eileen was born. Jim left for England that day. On Oct 14 1943, oldest daughter Doris was married to Harold Wilson. Jim got on board the liner Athlone Casll (Castle) on that day.

Even during the hard years, few things brought Margaret to tears. One time though when the children were sick, she borrowed a thermometer from Mrs Green. It got broken and there was just no money to replace it. After Joyce was born, Grandma Mary McDonald and Chuck bought a sack of groceries and she cried then. Later they mailed dresses and things for the girls.

In 1946, Jim, home from the service, came from Bayard with the news Bayard Morors was taking orders for new cars. He took John in and he put his name on the list. He had the first new Ford 4 door sedan in town. It cost $1287 and with the spare tire $20 more. What a luxury!.

1949 was another big year. Jeannie, only 18, had taken the train out to California to meet her boyfriend and on Jan 27, 1949 married Thomas Jefferson. Four days later, Jan 31, Jim married Catherine Carr in Bayard. Bill was to be the best man but none of the family could attend because they were snowed in from the Blizzard of 1949. They were only 14 miles away. By the end of the year there were 3 grandchildren, Cynthia and Doris just 6 days apart in November and Greg in December. Three weeks later on Jan 14, 1950, Bill married Nellie Harsin.

In 1950, they bought land 10 miles north of Valentine, NE. It was a big farmhouse back in the trees. Margaret was able to can much of the fruit from the orchards. There were three more grandchildren in 1951, John, Patricia and Thomas, and in 1952 Betty married Harold Mauch. The family grew quickly with William born in '52, Stephen in '53, Douglas, James and Timothy in '54 and Catherine in '55. On April 18, 1959 Ann married Ruben Grooms.

In 1959, with their family almost gone, they moved to Lingle, Wyoming. Although still ranching, John enjoyed being at the sale barn and helped there. Joyce married Cliff Belville on Dec 26, 1959 - another big year with the two youngest married. John and Margaret had raised 7 children with no broken bones! There were eight new grandchildren in the decade they lived in Lingle; Trey in 1960, Celia and Regina in '61 less than three weeks apart in October, John and William Lamar in '63, Julie and David in '66 and Michelle in '68.

In the fall of 1969, they retired and moved to a home in Scottsbluff, NE. For the first time in both their lives, they were not living in the country. On May 24, 1970 John died of cancer in Scottsbluff and was buried there. The family continues to grow andf Margaret keeps track of them all from Loveland, CO. In 1973 the first great grandchild was born followed by 12 more and in 1977 and '78, the last two grandchildren, John Matthew and Jamie. There are 44 descendants of John and Margaret McDonald Fosket; 7 children, 23 grandchildren, and 13 great grandchildren with four grandchildren deceased. Five descendants were called John and five James. Of her grandchildren, she said in July 1980 "they say young people have gone to the dogs, gone to the devil, but I don't have a single grandchild who isn't a decent, responsible citizen - I'm proud of every one of them."