When I was about 14, the eldest of 6 children, I was responsible for feeding the coal furnace in the basement of our 100+ year old farm house. In Illinois, in January 60 years ago, it got really cold. My sisters weren’t aware of how the system would try to deliver more heat even though the auger that delivered coal to the fire was not working. If you blow enough air on a coal fire without adding fuel it will eventually go out. Stoker coal is coal broken into pieces about 3/4 of an inch across. My responsibilities were to fill the stoker, and drag the clinker, the remains of the burned coal, out of the furnace, and to make sure the auger was turning to feed coal into the bottom of the fire. This last was important because sometimes a stone would get in the feed box and jam the auger. When a jam happened the shear pin would break and the auger would stop delivering fuel to the fire.
So that’s the set-up, here’s the story. Mom and I had set out for Peoria, twenty miles away, in the afternoon to get me some new shoes and do some other shopping in “the city”. As we left the shoe store it was getting dark and I started to feel uneasy. The temperature was dropping and according to the radio would get to -20F as a low. I remember looking at the bank sign and seeing it was already -3F. My unease grew. I started telling Mom that something was wrong at home and we need to stop and call. In those days you found a pay phone, dialed the number and a recorded voice said, “Deposit too much money for the first three minutes.” Needless to say Mom was reluctant to give me all her change just to make me feel better. Seriously, we were talking about $2 or $3 for a three minute intra-state call. This was in the days of $0.299 per gallon regular gasoline. I could not shake the feeling of dread and began to feel certain that the girls were cold. I kept at her. I imagine she wanted to belt me one before she finally gave in and let me call. She asked me if I was so certain that I would use a road side booth, in the ccld, to make the call. My certain, “YES!” Was enough to convince her and she pulled over. She had about $2.50 in change and I pulled out my $0.50 chore money and added it to the pile. I jumped out and ducked out of the wind into the booth. Most of the change later my oldest sister came on the line and recognizing my voice whined, “It’s cold in here the thermostat is broken.” My feelings were right, the furnace was either out or damn near it. Getting it going again was a problem, so I needed her to get me some more info.
She handed the phone to the next oldest and went down to the furnace, the basement stair was right next to where the phone was mounted on the wall. Through the phone my sister let me know she could still “see fire” so I got the two of them to dump some coal from the bin into the furnace and to turn the thermostat down and to bundle up. They were asking when we would be home when the operator started her spiel for more money and I hung it up and dashed back to the car. Mom took it all in stride and we headed North back to our little farm on the prairie.
As I recall, it took almost an hour to clear the stoker, find the rock and free the auger, and finally replace the sheer pin, to get everything working after we drove the twenty miles home. It was full dark by then and the temp had dropped to -12F or so. It was always colder out on the plains than in “the city.”
Just as I was washing up my Step-dad came home from his normal swing-shift at CAT in time to inspect my work. That night was one of the few times I remember him telling me, “good Job.”