The Christmas Goose

The Dust Bowl and Great Depression were not kind to Granddad and Grandma Wyatt.  In 1930, they returned to Missouri after the drought made it impossible to continue irrigation farming in Maher, Colorado.  Arter and his brother, Truman, loaded their families and all their belongings into two cars and drove nearly 1,000 miles from Maher to Taney County Missouri.  One of the cars didn’t have a heater, so they heated a large stone each night by the fire, then wrapped it in a quilt each morning and set it in the floorboard to warm Ada’s feet as they drove.  Unlike Grandpa and Granny Roberts, who had a creek bottom farm that provided ample food for their large family, Granddad and Grandma Wyatt struggled to survive with three growing boys and one daughter moving from farm to farm along the flat, dry ridge running from Taneyville and Dickens to Kissee Mills.  Grandma Amy made the most of everything including an occasional ham bone that was used to make multiple pots of pinto beans and often shared with a neighbor who had nothing to flavor their beans.  Any hint of meat with a meal was a special treat in those days.  Dad vividly recalled one bitter Christmas when a lone goose landed on the large pond behind Cum Williams’ barn.  Granddad Wyatt took the 22 rifle, sneaked over the pond bank, and, with a single shot, dispatched the goose.  Four excited and likely hungry children watched as Grandma Wyatt carefully plucked the goose and placed all edible parts into a large Dutch oven.  As the goose baked, the house was filled with a pleasant aroma and hope that was far too scarce during the Depression.  Seven decades later, Dad still vividly remembered the goose as the most wonderful meal and best Christmas of his childhood.