Most of my personal belongings have been in a livestock trailer while Grandpa’s cattle were still grazing the back pasture. Our couch, kitchen table, sock drawer and bath linens a couple times traveled in the vented shelter of a trailer designed to haul pigs and cattle.One of the coolest things about living or working on a farm is access to stuff. A backhoe to plant trees in our yard. A flatbed trailer to haul lumber for a house project. Farmers are known to give equipment multiple roles on the farm. As a child, Mom swam in a large, round livestock water tank, which served the cattle when she and her brothers were done with it. Old tractor tires became sandboxes. The hayrack was a float in the homecoming parade. We even used the machine shed for our wedding reception.
Just in the last 16 months, Grandpa’s 27-foot livestock trailer has moved grandchildren to new homes three times. The trailer has unloaded belongings along a city street, country road and a subdivision between the extremes.
Like our home when company is coming, most farmers’ livestock trailers are spotless only on special occasions. Those include when a farmkid’s furniture needs moved or during 4-H Fair time, when we would spend a couple hours pressure-washing the manure from the trailer’s interior to make a shining appearance at the fairgrounds.
These recent family moves reminded me of annual move-in days during college. More than likely, the upper-classmen who served on the dormitory moving crews still recall my arrival and no one else’s. The gal next door rented a U-Haul to transport her belongings. Other families had mini vans with the back seats removed. We had a pickup truck pulling a livestock trailer that stated the name and address of our farm. For six consecutive years, livestock trailers hauled my brother or me to college.
We know how to move furniture farm style.
Joanie Stiers
Williamsfield, Illinois
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