My parents were Peter Jacob Tiessen, born in 1875 and Elizabeth Fast Tiessen, born in 1879, both in the Molotschna Colony. I was the youngest child. Father was first married to Anna Enns with whom he had six children, namely Peter who died in infancy, Anna, Jacob, Peter, Margaret and Elizabeth who died in infancy. Father’s first wife died in 1903 and in 1905, father married my mother. Their children were Frank, Elizabeth, Nick, Agatha, Mary, Katharine, Jacob, who died of convulsions at 18 months, and me, a second Jacob. The children were all born in Schoenfeld with the exception of me: I was born in Blumstein. The village of Blumstein was founded in 1804 and had 5,000 acres of land. Most families farmed; there were also small industries.
My brother Frank remembered that in Russia, Father always wore a good suit and he seldom saw him work. We had three maids, one children’s maid and three or four hired men during the winter months. In summer, up to 30 extra men and women were hired. The workers ate in a separate house on our 700 acre farm.
My Tiessen family came to Canada in 1924. I had whooping cough on the ship and when the doctor examined me he said to my parents, “You have a big family, just throw him into the ocean!”
In Canada we came to the Hoffman family. Here their daughter Katie babysat me. We stayed in Waterloo from July until March, when we moved to Essex County. In 2008, I had the privilege of visiting with Katie who was 96, and sharp as a tack!
When I was four or five years old, I remember standing on a Benkje (little chair) and directing an imaginary Sunday School choir. One day, in Essex County, when brother Nick was driving our car, brother Frank was sitting in front and Dad and I were in the back seat. Dad yelled “Jack’s falling out!” Frank grabbed me by my red coat (which Tom Duke had given me) and pulled me back in.
Our passage for the 10 of us cost over $1400 from the Russian border to Waterloo. Father was worried about paying this off. Nothing unnecessary could be purchased until it was paid; it took us three long years. The Peter Gossens, John Tiessens and our family sharecropped a Duke farm. The following two years we farmed there alone.
In 1927, Dad bought a Bowman farm on concession one (County Road 20 today) for $12,000. It had 100 acres with 10 acres of bush and 10 acres of stumps. In three year’s time we lost the farm and then bought it back for $6,500. We had stayed in the house. In 1928 we had a chimney fire and the house burnt down. We managed to save the downstairs furniture and moved into the second house on the farm. Vorsänger (song leader) Henry Wiens lived in this second house. We slept on the kitchen floor until the Wiens’s had moved out.
In 1927, tobacco had sold for 48 cents per pound; in 1928, it was 2 cents per pound. In 1940, Harry Ford, a field man for Heinz, came and begged us to grow more tomatoes. We three brothers were Heinz’s biggest growers with 30 acres, all handpicked until 1952. We brothers worked together until 1952; then the tax people ripped us apart because we weren’t registered as a company. We paid for the first farm in fall of 1942. Mother had died of liver cancer in 1939; our Dad had had pneumonia five times and died of a heart attack in 1943.
I attended the Hillman school where the first year my sister and I were the only Mennonites. Later Susie Hildebrand, Laura and Peter Gossen came for a short time. During the summer, my neighbour Don Setterington and I rode Don’s pony to school every morning, and the pony walked back home by himself. During the winter months we made the two-mile trot on foot. My teachers were Mrs. Sherman, Mr. Poor and then Miss McIntyre who taught me math, my favourite subject. There were 62 students in one room. Miss McIntyre later married a Tilden and taught at Point Pelee.
After seven years of school, I stayed home and cleaned the stable, along with other chores. My parents hoped I’d return to school. I used the crosscut saw to cut trees for lumber and logs for heating the house. In 1938 Dad bought our first tractor, an F 12 McCormick from Matheson’s with no money down. It had steel wheels, along with a disc and plow, all for $1,000. Nick did custom work disking for 75 cents per acre and ploughing for $2.50 per acre. Soon the tractor was paid for. We boys kept no money for ourselves. The farm gas was delivered by the Shell company near the railroad where Sherman’s is located in 2009, north of town.
I was baptized by Rev. N.N.Driedger in 1941; Rev. Rempel had instructed our catechism class during Rev. Driedger’s illness.
In 1943 my family bought an International combine from Matheson’s in Leamington; it cost about $600. It cut a four-foot swath; today’s combines cut 30 or 40 feet at a time. During the 1940s I worked on the Waldemar Unger farm where John Krahn sharecropped flu tobacco. Here I earned 50 cents daily.
In 1963 Elvira Langeman and I were married in the Mennonite church on Oak Street. Ern Driedger built us a new house for $14,000. When I got the lumber from Ludlams on Erie Street North, I was puzzled by the extra charge until I was informed that GST had come into being.
One Saturday I ran out of baling twine and needed to get some quickly. On the way, I first hit a ditch. I shut the tractor off, flew up and landed on the big wheel which threw me clear. I was fortunate that only my left ear was cut. Dr. Froese sewed it up.
One day in 1996, Denise and Martin Rahn came to our house for supper where we discussed the possibility of getting the MCC meat canner to come to Leamington. The first Canadian location was the University of Guelph’s parking lot. There they had three trailers: one for cooking, one for canning and one for meals. Next year I went to Guelph during canning time and the third year, it came to Leamington. We canned 15,000 pounds that first year, and 30,000 pounds every year since. During this time we’ve changed from beef to turkey. As a result, there is no concern about mad cow disease and the turkey meat has no broth. This canning effort has drawn in the larger community including Comber, Dresden, Blenheim, Harrow, Kingsville, Essex and Amherstburg.
During the 1970s, a young English-speaking couple from India became stranded at the Canada-USA border because of a problem with their documents. On Sunday morning, there was a church announcement asking if anyone could take these people in for six weeks. Elvira and I offered to take them in; they needed to stay for six months. They lived upstairs in our home and attended church services with us. Years later I attended their daughter’s wedding in the Detroit area where I sat at the head table!
In 1997 Elvira had a stroke and needed to go to the Mennonite Home where she received excellent care. Here Marjorie Gillanders, and others, befriended her. Elvira died in 2002.
AK 2009
