Lester

We drove the 565 miles up to the Northwest corner of Iowa this past weekend for a big family reunion. Grandpa Fred and Grandma Carrie started it all with their marriage in 1907. They had 14 children who produced 84 grandchildren. Grandpa and Grandma have been gone for some time now, but 5 of their children and 6 spouses were in attendance. There are currently 733 direct descendants and 1037 descendants including spouses and stepchildren. That's quite an impact that one family has made in 100 years! It was a day of fellowship, good food, reminiscing, and storytelling.

For me, going to Lester is like visiting Lake Wobegon ("the little town that time forgot"). That's a compliment, not a slight! It still has the agrarian/small town culture that Central Illinois lost a generation ago. They are thoroughly modern, but cling to the old fashioned values of family and Faith. They are a community of hard working people, friendly, hospitable, conservative, with large families.
The rolling farmland is dotted with traditional family farms. Out here they still use silos, they bale the ditches, and everybody has chores to do. Farms are diverse with dairy, beef, hogs, sheep, chickens, ducks, turkeys, and geese - sometimes all on the same farm. There are multiple generations working together. They set the start times for social events and church services by when the milkers will be finished. Most of the women still have large gardens, and know how to butcher a chicken, pluck a goose, or bake pies and bread from scratch.

I've been going to Lester for 50+ years now, and have many memories. I learned the town helping my cousin do the daily paper route. We watched the trains come through town regularly, played in the abandoned depot, climbed the switch towers, and put pennies on the tracks. We swam in Mud Creek and played ball in cow pastures. Our first stop after arriving (and kissing Grandpa and Grandma) was Butch's store on Main Street. We called it the "candy store". It was a true old fashioned grocery store with a penny candy counter behind glass and floor-to-ceiling shelves of groceries that Butch would retrieve for you from his ladder. A pot belly stove sat in the middle of the room along with barrels of bulk commodities.
On Saturday afternoon we would make the rounds to all the Uncles' and Aunts' farms, and get a snack at each one. I routinely heard my Uncles tell us: "You Illinois people have it made!" We went for weddings, holidays, reunions, and funerals - some tragic, and some victories.
As teenagers, we spent Saturday nights out on a country road or in town at Louie's. On a busy Saturday night, cars would park down the middle of Main Street. Sunday morning, we were sweating on the back bench of the un-airconditioned church listening to one of Bro. Leo's hellfire and brimstone sermons. I think the attendance at church is still greater than the population of the town.

The town whistle still blows to inform the residents of the time(6AM, noon, 6PM, 9PM - I think). The trains still rumble through town at any hour of the day or night. Life has a little slower pace here in this part of the Midwest. Half of my upbringing is rooted in the faith and heritage of this little community. Each time I leave, I think a little part of me stays there.


For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,
That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;
Ephesians 3:14-16

For the LORD thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills;
Deut. 8:7