Ephrata woman shares story of early century Grant County

Mordhorst's father arrived in area on emigrant train

EPHRATA - Eleanor Mordhorst, 92, recalls her childhood of milking cows, using a rod weeder and operating a combine pulled by horses and mules while growing up on a Wilson Creek-area farm.

Stories like Mordhorst's will be told during a style show in February as part of Grant County's centennial celebration, said her acquaintance, Beverly Mayer of Ephrata. Models will wear historical dress and "special ladies" like Mordhorst will be honored, Mayer added.

Mayer said she's looking for people with stories of the county's history during that time. The time frames include the 1899 period, which is 10 years before Grant County officially formed in 1909, and 10 years later in 1919.

Some of the Wilson Creek area's early families arrived on an emigrant train from Minnesota, like Mordhorst's grandfather Adam Hirschel, father Harry Christian and some of her mother Lillian Roschmann's relatives. The majority of the people on the train were of German descent, Mordhorst said.

In 1901, Marion Hay of the Big Bend Land Company convinced a group of 13 families (including Mordhorst's) to sell their holdings in Minnesota and come to the Big Bend area (now Grant County), according to Mordhorst's family history book. Hay later became Washington state's seventh governor.

The families on the train sold some of their property before leaving, but machinery and animals remained. Men and boys slept in the cars with the animals, so they would be fed and watched. Women and children stayed in different coaches where they could cook and do other chores.

During the journey to Grant County, Mordhorst's family brought hand tools, a kitchen range, beds, food, a wagon, a harrow, a foot-burner plow and a disc. Two mares, a colt, three cows and some dogs also rode the train.

Times were much different during Mordhorst's childhood than today and included years without electricity. So cooking for large harvest crews was done over a stove heated by fire.

Mordhorst was born in 1916, 15 years after her father and grandfather arrived in the area and the same year a house ordered from Sears was erected for the family.

The Sears company sold between 70,000 to 75,000 homes through its mail order "Modern Homes" program from 1908 to 1940, according to Sears' Web site.

The four-room home is a double-story and square and still stands today. A couple lives in the home now and has completed some work on it, she said.

Mayer said the couple is planning to renovate the home as a "kit house."

Mordhorst said she didn't live in the mail-order home until her high school years.

Instead, she grew up on her grandfather's farm after her mother died from giving birth to a baby girl, her family history books states. The baby died a few weeks after birth. At the time, Mordhorst was only 3 years old and her brother Howard was 5.

In her family history book, Mordhorst wrote she recalled "many happy times and sad times too - the lean years and more prosperous years. All members of the Hirshel (her grandfather's) family were accustomed to hard work, and each one, including the children, had a share of the work load to carry. As a result the farm thrived through industry and perseverance, while many failed and did not survive the drought and dust-bowl years."

Mordhorst remembers gathering eggs, riding a horse to the Timm School for area grade-school children with her brother and also canning produce and making sauerkraut and pickles.

Her father remarried a widow with two children in about 1929, Mordhorst said.

Mordhorst graduated from Wilson Creek High School in 1932, attended various area colleges and universities and married her brother's best friend, Boyd Mordhorst, in 1937. The couple eventually returned to Grant County, lived in Ephrata and had a son, Rawson. Boyd died in 1998.