Submitter’s note: The story we share with you today was written by Roxie Kaserman Cullum.
Samuel and Margaret Kaserman, my paternal grandparents, came to Brown County from Edinburgh, Indiana, more than 100 years ago, before the Civil War. They bought a farm north of Railroad Road in Jackson Township which is still in the family. I, Roxie, their granddaughter, own 50 acres of this land.
Samuel Kaserman built a log house and continued to work at the cooper’s trade, making whiskey barrels in Edinburgh until his land was paid for. His wife, Margaret, lived in the log cabin with their six children, while Samuel continued to work at Edinburgh.
My maternal grandfather, William Long, was also in Brown County before the Civil War. He was a soldier in the war and went with Sherman to Georgia. My brother was named for General Sherman.
When the war was over William Long came to Columbus, Indiana, where he was discharged. He went to Franklin, then to Morgantown on the old “jerkwater” train that ran from Franklin to Martinsville. Uncle Willard Long met him at Morgantown with an extra horse. They rode to William’s home in Brown County. My grandfather Long owned 100 acres of land which he divided into 33-acre plots for his children.
William Long’s daughter, Arra (1867-1936) married George Kaserman (1872-1964), the son of Samuel and Margaret Kaserman.
In 1881, at the age of 14, my mother, Arra Long, drove with her father to Paris, Illinois, to move my great-uncle, Boser Long, back to Indiana. The family dog refused to cross the Wabash River on the covered bridge at Terre Haute. He swam the river and the family waited for him on the far side of the river. At night, the family stopped along the way and camped. The neighbors gave them hot food and feed for their horses. Four horses pulled a hay wagon which was three feet wider than an ordinary wagon. A large canvas covered the frame of the hay wagon. The cows were tied to the wagon and walked behind it.
I am the youngest of four children and I am now 80 years old. I had two brothers and one sister, Bessie. They all went to Indiana University and graduated. They worked their way through by teaching for several years in Brown County.
Frank Sherman went to Purdue, after Indiana University, for two years and took electrical engineering. He was 32 years old when he finished.
My next brother, Jesse, after IU went to Michigan School of Mines.
I have one brother left. Frank Sherman, now 85, is a retired lieutenant commander living in Norfolk, Virginia. During World War II, he went up and down the Atlantic coast fixing light beacons.
Bessie, my sister, taught school at Helmsburg and Brown County one-room schools for many years.
I did not go to college. After I graduated from Helmsburg High School, I did substitute teaching in the county.
When I was growing up on the farm, we raised our own food and meat. We butchered hogs and had big gardens with many kinds of vegetables and potatoes. Mother canned vegetables for the winter and we sold garden produce. About the only things we bought were sugar, coffee and pepper.
My father had a team of horses and worked on the township roads. He earned enough money to pay the taxes. Mother and Father were hard workers. Mother was a weaver. She was a wonderful seamstress and kept us in homemade clothing. She tore rags into strips and wove rugs to sell.
We children walked to school and back home after school. We walked on what is now State Road 135 three miles from Railroad Road to Greenwood School before we went to the school in Helmsburg. We had little tin buckets to carry our lunch in: fried pies made from dried apples and peaches, and ham sandwiches.
During the flu epidemic in 1918, when I was 14, the Brown County schools were closed for four weeks. My sister, Bessie, and I went to Bloomington and stayed in the home of a half-sister, Gusta Beck. We worked in a furniture factory. I sanded furniture. We wore white masks over our noses while we worked. We came back to Brown County when the schools opened again.
We lived through hard times in the Depression. There was no work for anybody.
In 1921, I married James (Jack) Cullum and lived in Helmsburg. Jack 1900-1975 was born in Griffin, Posey County, Indiana. He worked in Evansville for the Illinois Central Railroad. He was trained as a clerk and a telegraph operator, then “floated” up and down the line as a relief man for other employees on the railroad who were sick or on vacation. About 1917, he took the place of the Helmsburg station agent for a time. Two years later, he came back to Helmsburg on a permanent basis as station agent and telegraph operator. At that time, all telegrams in Brown County were sent from Helmsburg.
In 1922, a tornado wiped out the town of Griffin, Indiana. Jack’s father was still living in there and his house was demolished. The Illinois Central knew of the destruction of the town, and at 10 o’clock at night on the day of the tornado, a train stopped at Helmsburg to pick Jack up. He found his father in what had been the yard of his home under a pile of debris.
The next morning, Jack called and told me to take the next train to Griffin. He said I would not believe the destruction unless I saw it. I left my 6-year-old son, James Jr., with his grandmother and went to meet Jack. The town was completely destroyed, absolutely flat.
Jack worked for the Illinois Central for 47 years, retiring at age 66. He then took the job of bookkeeper for the family broom factory, located in Helmsburg, Indiana.
Submitted by Pauline Hoover, Brown County Historical Society
