As mentioned earlier the Ekola's owned a large brick home with an attached barn. Every year they would have their fields cut and raked with a hay baler. They would store the bales in the upstairs loft in the barn. My friends and I would sneak into the barn by a small trap door in the back of the barn. Once inside we would go about building hay bale forts. We would generally make too much noise and Mrs. Ekola (Tess) would hear us and come into the barn area. We would always know when she was coming and we would dive into the different forts. After waiting for a while she would go back into her house.
Fort building was something that we did in a variety of ways. My parent's land was divided by the fields and an old growth forest of pine trees. The pine grove had built up a layer of matted pine needles that made an excellent covering for our forts. We would gather up the down tree limbs and would make a fort frame by tying the branches at a height of 6 feet between a few close pine trees. We then would carefully lift the matted pine needles by using our hands to slowly get pine needle patches that were about 2 feet square. We then would lay these mats on the framework. The finished fort was very dark inside with only a small crawl space for an entrance and it had a very earthy smell. We sometimes built multiple frames and the fort would have 2 or 3 rooms. Generally, a few of the older boys in the neighborhood would destroy our forts after a few days by trying to run up the side of the fort. We actually once built a fort that was so strong that we could run up its side without destroying it. Fort building kept us busy many summer days.
Fort building was something that we did in a variety of ways. My parent's land was divided by the fields and an old growth forest of pine trees. The pine grove had built up a layer of matted pine needles that made an excellent covering for our forts. We would gather up the down tree limbs and would make a fort frame by tying the branches at a height of 6 feet between a few close pine trees. We then would carefully lift the matted pine needles by using our hands to slowly get pine needle patches that were about 2 feet square. We then would lay these mats on the framework. The finished fort was very dark inside with only a small crawl space for an entrance and it had a very earthy smell. We sometimes built multiple frames and the fort would have 2 or 3 rooms. Generally, a few of the older boys in the neighborhood would destroy our forts after a few days by trying to run up the side of the fort. We actually once built a fort that was so strong that we could run up its side without destroying it. Fort building kept us busy many summer days.
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